Fear Becomes You
by Deltree
Summary: Xander and Spike accidentally get cursed during Xander's Jr. year of high school. Then they have to deal. Warning: contains nonslash Spander
1. Changes

Title: Fear Becomes You

Timeline: Jr. Year sometime after Halloween and before Angelus.

Pairing: This is going to be Spike/Xander and all those other season 2 couples on the side. And it's going to be non-slash. Sorry.

Summary: Spike and Xander are accidentally placed under a curse during Jr year. Then they have to deal.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot. And even the plot's been kinda used before.

* * *

Chapter #1: Changes

Xander woke to the sound of worried voices and an aching body. Opening his eyes, Xander found himself lying on the couch in a rather tidy living room.

This was new.

And rather strange.

But, after getting a better look at the room, Xander was relieved to find that this was not, in fact, some bizarre alternate version of his living room.

It had a bookcase.

It also had a Giles, he noticed, when Giles entered his field of vision in search of some book from said bookcase. He could hear Willow and Buffy talking behind him, but couldn't really understand what they were saying, and didn't really want to turn around and ask.

This must be Giles' place, he decided.

It fit the man.

And, so, now with the where answered, his mind was free to silently panic over the what and how.

The last thing he remembered was the park.

He and his girls had been going home from the Bronze, casually walking down the main street, when Spike and ten of his minions made their dramatic entrance. The fight had been going as usual—he thrown into walls, Wills into trashcans, and Buffy kicking serious ass—but then Spike had seemed to take a rock out of his duster. He had seemed to really want Buffy to look at it too, which usually wasn't a good sign. Luckily, Spike never got the chance as Buffy kicked the rock out of his hands and, soon after, kicked him into a wall. Spike had quickly stood, but then, just as quickly, he had collapsed, convulsing and almost screaming in pain. Confused, and in no immediate danger as Buffy was quickly dusting the last remaining minions, Xander had cautiously approached the body. All signs had pointed to unconscious, particularly the sign where Spike didn't suddenly jump up and grab him, or even twitch, when Xander poked him. But Xander had wanted to be certain, so he had checked again, lifting Spike's lifeless arm and waving it around like a noodle. It was then that he had noticed the strange red stone. Picking it up, Xander had seen . . . something . . . and then there had been pain.

_Serious _pain.

Vaguely he had heard himself screaming, but he had really been too caught up with how his entire body had been on fire to care.

And after that . . . he must've passed out.

But that still didn't answer the why. Had somebody attacked him with a flame-thrower or something from behind?

While he was busy remembering, he had been slowly pushing his body into a sitting position. Willow, seeing him sitting up, moved around the couch to sit at his side. Following her, Buffy squished in to sit on his other side, while Giles, having found the desired book, stood watching him uncertainly. All of them were clearly worried.

Looking at him with wide eyes, Willow asked, "Xander, you're awake. I was so worried. Are you OK? Do you need anything? Aspirin? Water? Another pillow? Something to eat?"

"Uh, no, Wills. I think I'm good. I just . . ." Frowning, he put a hand to his aching head. "What happened?" And did his voice sound higher than usual?

At this, the look on Willow's face shifted from concerned worry to nervously hesitant. And, when she turned to Giles for help, Xander started to feel a little nervous himself. That look always meant something bad. Especially when it was followed by Giles going all British, like he was doing now.

Giles put his book down on the table and answered, "Well . . . we're not quite sure. According to Buffy and Willow you started to scream and go into convulsions quite . . . spontaneously. There was no actual attacker. Buffy suspects Spike, but seeing as he seemed to have, uh, gone through a . . . similar experience, it is really most unlikely. As it is, you were found next to an amulet, of a sort. Willow has told me that she thinks she may have seen you holding it before you, er, underwent your . . . ordeal. I haven't actually been able to get a good look at it as I'm not sure of the exact trigger of the thing. It is most likely sight or touch, which, well, makes it, understandably, very difficult. I—

Buffy, interrupting, gave him a significant look. "Maybe you could actually answer the question?"

"Oh, yes, right, er, anyways, this amulet . . .it . . ." He took his glasses off and began to rub. "It, er . . . it . . well, that is. . ." At a loss for how to continue he paused and looked to Willow and Buffy for help. They said nothing.

"It . . . ?" Xander asked. And again with the voice.

Giles put his glasses back on. "Well, this amulet, it, may have . . . er, well, what I mean to say is . . . it . . ."

Seeing that Giles wasn't going to be saying anything useful in the near future, Buffy cut in again, placing a hand on Xander's arm. "It turned you into a girl."

"Yeah right, good one," Xander laughed, lightly and much higher than usual. Hearing this, he trailed off and, starting to look a little worried, lifted a hand to his neck. "What's wrong with my voice?"

Giles watched him, clearly concerned. Willow and Buffy gave him synchronized sympathetic/worried looks, as Willow reached over to hold Xander's hand.

They were serious.

Xander started shaking his head, "No. No. There is no way I'm a . . a . . ." he moved his free hand in frantic _that-thing_ gestures as he looked back and forth between their faces, searching for anything that would tell him that they were joking, that he wasn't a . . .

His voice was just because he . . .

Panicked now, he brought both of his hands up to his chest and grabbed breasts. Giles let out an embarrassed "oh, dear" and looked away.

His eyes widened. "Oh God"

Then, with something like dread, he reached down and grabbed at his crotch.

"Xander!" Willow blushed, embarrassed, and Buffy quickly grabbed his arm and moved his hand away from that area. Xander was too busy having a complete mental breakdown to feel embarrassed.

"No, no, nonononoNo!"

He felt no penis.

He grabbed again, moving his hand around to see if maybe it had just moved, only to be stopped, yet again, by Buffy. Where was his penis? He needed a penis.

This couldn't be happening. It wasn't happening. It couldn't.

Distantly, he heard Buffy continue--"That rock-thing apparently got Spike too. We're not really sure how, though. And he's not a girl. We think he's alive, ya know? Human. He's breathing and has a pulse and everything."—but he wasn't listening.

No. Just . . . just NO. This wasn't happening. He was dreaming. This was all just some weird dream and he was going to wake up soon and he would be home, in bed, with a penis, and no boobs.

Maybe . . .

He pinched his arm hard.

Ow. Still asleep.

He began to try again.

This time Willow grabbed his arm, stopping him. "Xander! Don't do that." But he still wasn't listening.

This wasn't a dream. Or maybe it _was_ a dream and what he had just felt was dream-pain.

Oh, god he wished it was a dream.

Looking up at Giles, he asked, "There's a cure, though, right? This is just temporary? Like, you'll make with the magic and I'll be a guy again? And soon?"

He could not be a girl. He was a guy. With all the guy-like parts. Like a penis.

Still flustered from embarrassment, Giles answered, "Well, yes, of course, I'm sure there is a cure. But, I'm afraid we cannot attempt one until we discover what the exact purpose of the amulet was. By the results, it seems to be incredibly powerful. And, well, these amulets can be rather tricky. Spike should know something about it, of course, so it shouldn't be that hard to find a cure." He gave Xander an apologetic look. "We . . .we just don't want to risk making your condition, er . . . worse."

With a sinking feeling, Xander asked, "So we're depending on Spike?"

"Well, and research."

"And what happens if we don't find anything?"

"Xander!" Willow and Buffy exclaimed.

"Well, I'm sure we'll find something. After all, everything has a cure of some sort."

Xander hoped Giles was right.

As it was, he could tell that he was going to be a girl for awhile. And he could deal with that.

But he couldn't be a girl forever.

He was a guy, after all. With a penis.

"Yeah, this'll be easy. And it could be interesting, too. Maybe you can learn what makes girl tick." Buffy smiled, then hearing a wheezing cough followed by the sound of gasping, she sighed. "But duty calls. By the sound of all that pathetic panting, our prisoner is awake and it's time for a little questioning." She patted his arm and walked away and his attention was pulled to Willow's smiling face.

"Yeah, Buffy'll question Spike and we'll find the cure and you'll be a guy again really soon. I'm sure of it."

Xander gave her a weak smile. He could pretend to believe that.

* * *

Spike woke to the sound of frantic female shouting, an aching body, and chafing wrists. "There's a cure, though, right? This is just temporary? Like, you'll make with the magic and I'll be a guy again? And soon?"

Lifting his head, he stared at his surroundings from his rather limited point of view, confused and in pain. Why was he in a bath tub?

He remembered that last night he had put his newest plan to kill the Slayer into action. The amulet he had gotten from some Wrenix traders last week had been guaranteed to make the Slayer weak and vulnerable. More importantly, it promised to _keep_ her weak and vulnerable. The only problem with the plan had been that she had to actually look into the eye drawn on the thing for it to actually work. And she hadn't. She had kicked it out of his hands and then had kicked him into a wall. Then, after he had gotten to his feet, his world had exploded into pain. He had the vaguest memory of seeing something red on the ground, but that could have been anything. It couldn't have been the amulet.

The Slayer must have taken him hostage for some reason.

And she must have set him on fire in order to kidnap him. It didn't really seem like a thing the bint would do, but there was no other explanation.

Either way, he was awake now and had obviously, and strangely, not been very damaged by the fire.

The idiots had also tied him up with ordinary rope and weren't even watching. He could break free and probably stroll out the bloody front door.

So Spike flexed his muscles, pushed against the rope, and tried to stand up.

The rope didn't break.

This was different, but Spike just shrugged mentally and pushed harder, using more muscle than should be necessary.

It still didn't break.

Now he was becoming a little worried.

Maybe it had been the amulet?

Trying again, Spike threw his whole body into it, straining hard against the rope . . .

. . . which stretched a little, but still didn't break.

And Spike was made painfully aware of heavy breathing and a quick throbbing sensation in his chest.

* * *

So, maybe the idiots weren't as daft as he'd thought. The rope must have been spelled to hold a vampire. He could still break out of 'em, though. It would just take a little more effort.

And the breathing . . . It was habit, is all. He didn't need to breathe.

And he was obviously imagining the throbbing. Going as mad as Dru, he was.

So, with a concentrated effort to break the habit and ignore the hallucination, Spike set at the ropes around his wrists, rubbing them against an edge of the bath tub spout near where he was tied to the knobs. If he could get his hands free, he could untie the rope binding his legs.

A short while into the task, his chest was starting to feel heavy as he fought back hard against the desire to inhale.

The rubbing started to get a little slower.

His face was heating up and the pressure kept building, as his arms and head started to feel heavy.

He did _not _need to bloody breathe!

There was now hardly any actual force behind the rubbing, as Spike focused all his attention on not breathing.

He couldn't do it.

Spike started to cough, dragging in deep, desperate breaths.

But that didn't prove anything.

It did call attention though, as the Slayer appeared in the doorway and moved to stand over him.

"Get something caught in your throat, Spike?" she asked with exaggerated worry.

Pathetic panting dying down, Spike looked up with a sneer.

"Wot do you want, Slayer?"

"Well, there was this new pair of sandals I saw at the mall, but, well, I think I'll just have to settle for you dead. But, oh, we seem to be having a problem with that too, huh?"

"Yer having problems using those bloody trunks y' call arms, are you? Maybe forgotten how t' use a pointy stick?"

"You mean you haven't noticed yet?" The bloody bitch looked amused.

Spike narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "Wot?"

"Well, you're alive!" she said and stepped back to watch his reaction.

"No'm not." And he wasn't.

"Ah, yes you are."

"I think I would know if I was bloody livin' or not." And he would. It seemed like it would be pretty obvious, what with the loud heartbeat and daft ideas about rescuing puppies or some such rot.

And besides, it was impossible.

"Right. And that little fit you just had? It had nothing to do with not getting enough oxygen."

"Too bloody right it didn't." He gave a very decisive nod.

"And if someone were to, say, put they're fingers right here," she placed her fingers against the long dead pulse-point on his neck, "they wouldn't feel a pulse."

He jerked his head away from her fingers. "Right"

"And the pulse I just felt was . . . ?"

"Hallucination. Yer going mad, you are. Should get someone to check that."

She let out a noise of annoyance, her arms flapping to show her teenaged opinion of _whatever_, as she turned back to whine at her little friends. "Giilleees. He's not listening. You talk to him."

"Er, yes, of course." Appearing in the doorway at her call, the Watcher regarded him seriously. "I'm afraid that what Buffy has said is true. You are, in fact, alive."

"No'm not."

The Watcher obviously didn't know what to do in the face of his clear denial to accept their lies. "Er, well, yes. Yes, you are."

Spike gave the old man a condescending smirk, "Riiight. And 'ow'd that 'appen?"

The Watcher raised a brow. "I believe I should be asking you that. It appears the cause was your amulet, after all."

Spike snorted derisively. "An' you think it gave me a pulse?" Couldn't happen.

"Er, well, yes. The effects do seem rather random, I'll admit, but, well. . ." He shrugged.

"An' why should I believe you?"

It couldn't be true.

The amulet was only supposed to make someone weaker, not bring them back to life.

"Well . . ." The Watcher paused and frowned, obviously wondering on how to continue. If he should bother trying to convince him or just leave him to rot. The Slayer answered that problem by cutting him off.

"It doesn't matter if you believe him. What matters is that it's true, so I can't kill you. But as soon as this is over, that'll be fixed and we, as in us and not you, who'll be dust, can go on with our lives."

"Yes, thank you Buffy." The Watcher dryly, giving his charge a look. "And now, I believe it is time for you and Willow to be going home. We'll deal with this tomorrow."

"But don't we need to question Spike?" She looked far too eager, really.

"No. It is far too late right now, and you have school in the morning. Spike isn't going anywhere. You can question him tomorrow."

The Slayer dismissed this easily. "Pfft, I'll be fine. And, anyway, this needs to be done."

"Yes. And it will be done tomorrow. Now go home."

Making as though to argue, she quickly changed her mind at her Watcher's stern look then turned with an annoyed sigh to apparently follow this order.

In a few seconds the humans were back to ignoring him completely, leaving him to rot for the night in a bloody uncomfortable position in a bath tub he quickly grew to hate.

He also grew to hate the humans just that much more. They would have to die. Not that they weren't going to die already, but now it was necessary. It was personal.

* * *

TBC


	2. TV Time

I still don't own anything.

And I really have absolutely no idea what the layout of Giles' apartment/condo is or even if he lives in the same place during the high school years as he does in the college years. So, I'm gonna make up my own arrangement.

* * *

Chapter # 2: TV Time

Staring at a white wall for hours upon end was not much in the way of entertainment, and Spike was going mad from boredom.

He would have been loudly cursing the humans, telling them in gruesome detail of all the tortures he would be putting them through when this was over, but they had gone to sleep shortly after the Slayer had left and weren't listening. He had tried to make enough noise to wake them up, but no such luck.

So he had taken to amusing himself by trying to silently imagine new and more creative tortures and how each of the Slayer's little group would react to each. Trying to out-do each one.

But that game had gotten boring.

It had also gotten depressing.

In order to follow through with those little daydreams, Spike would have to escape.

He would also have to be able.

And he would have to wan—but he wasn't going down that road.

So, not having anything else to do, Spike was being forced to actually think of things other than murder and mayhem.

He thought about possible escape plans, and couldn't think of any.

He wondered about Dru and if she had noticed his absence yet. If the stars had told her what had happened to him. If she was okay.

He thought about his . . .situation.

No matter what others had said, Spike was not an idiot. You didn't exist as long as he had, through all the experiences he'd been through, with Drusilla as mad as she was, by being an idiot.

He knew himself. He knew his strengths and weaknesses.

And, more importantly, he knew when to admit when something had gone seriously wrong.

This was one of those times.

Lying in the Watcher's tub, arms up and tied to the knobs at an annoying angle, coarse rope chafing his wrists and pulled a little too tight around his thighs, Spike admitted to himself that the white-hats might have been telling the truth.

He could be human.

Possibly.

He had been thinking, forcing himself to think, that he hadn't looked at the eye, or that, even if he had, the eye didn't work the same on demons as it did on humans. That, if he was cursed at all, it had only made weaker. And maybe dulled his senses and put him under a compulsion to breathe.

But these long hours of imprisoned solitude were forcing him to acknowledge other undeniable facts.

After all, even if Spike were to ignore the new experiences of a heart beat and a blood deep sense of _alive_, there were other changes he couldn't make excuses for.

For one, he couldn't shift into his true face, no matter how hard he tried.

His stomach had also been twisting and making odd noises—that disgustingly loud sign of human hunger.

And then, of course, was the kicker.

He had to use the bloody loo.

* * *

The night at Giles' had gone by without anything too weird happening.

Well, besides the whole sleeping at _Giles'_ thing, that is. Even if Xander had only slept on the couch.

And, of course, there was the experience of a Giles breakfast, which was healthy, at a table with another person, and, most importantly, not a cold Pop-Tart.

And then the not having to rush out to school.

And the ultimate weirdness of discovering that Giles actually had a TV. With _cable_

But other then all those things, everything had been normal.

Xander had been watching cartoons for a couple hours now, still in the clothes he had worn last night. Giles had offered some of his clothes, which were surprisingly not all tweed, but Xander was in no hurry to get himself naked. Or to touch himself, in any way, anywhere below his shoulders and above his knees.

And there was no way in hell he would be going anywhere near a mirror.

Which was why he hadn't touched any liquids other than that small glass of orange juice from breakfast. And that had been only because Giles had been watching.

He knew he was going to have to face his . . . temporary change sooner then he'd like due to necessary bodily functions that he really wished he didn't have, but that didn't mean he couldn't hold out against it for as long as he could. And he was definitely not facing it in the same bathroom as the evil not-so-dead. Giles really hadn't thought through the whole tie-Spike-up-in-the-only-bathroom-thing.

His cartoon had just ended, the credits beginning to roll, when he heard a louder than normal _THUMP_ coming from the direction of the bathroom. These kinds of noises had been going on for a while, so, not even bothering to move, he just yelled, "Keep it down!"

If you ignored the random bursts of British cursing and threats of death, their prisoner had actually been behaving himself rather well.

"This is cruel an' unusual punishment, it is! Isn' this against th' whole white hat rule book or somethin'?"

"Like you haven't done much worse." What, he was expecting sympathy?

"Well, 'm not dead anymore, now am I? I'm a bloody human being. That's wot you all said, init? So I deserve ta be treated like one, I do."

Xander sighed, "Who cares if you're human; you're still evil. So you stay in that tub and not kill me like a good little boy."

"Yer bloody right I'm evil! The minute I get my fangs back I'll kill ya!"

He rolled his eyes. "And that's helping your case _so_ much."

"Well it's not like 'm tryin' ta get yer trust, now, 'm I?" And, yes, this was true.

Xander sighed. His first day of guilt-free hooky and unlimited TV, in which he had been hoping to lose himself in a TV induced coma and ignore the suckiness of reality for a few hours, was being ruined. Maybe if he gave the bastard what he wanted he could get back to his TV—well, if whatever Spike wanted wasn't something completely gross and something that Xander could actually get.

"Then what do you want?"

"Well, I'm human now ain't I? With, ya know, all those human needs and such. . ."

He sounded completely disgusted. But it was the faint embarrassment that was really the deciding factor. Xander didn't see Spike as the type to be embarrassed by much, so this was probably a once in a lifetime opportunity. And he would not miss such a prime target of mockage.

Getting up from his spot slouched on the couch, Xander got his feet caught in his too long pants, remembered to lift the material, carefully ignored the reason for that mental memo, and made his way to the bathroom.

Spike was in the same position Buffy had left him in last night, arms twisted above his head so they could be securely tied to the knobs of the tub, legs bound together at the thighs and ankles.

It looked incredibly uncomfortable.

Leaning against the door frame, careful not to look at the mirror, Xander asked again, "What do you want?"

Spike's stomach growled and Xander saw him give it a disgusted look.

"You're hungry? Well, sorry, but I'm afraid Giles doesn't keep any blood in the fridge. I could look, I guess, but I gotta say, I don't think it's gonna be happening." He shook his head, feigning regret.

"Then don't get me blood, idiot." Spike snorted, then turned his head to face the wall as he added sullenly, "Doubt it'd do any good anyways."

"Okay, human food. And how're you gonna eat it? I am so not feeding you."

"Then untie my hands" Spike looked back at him. Stomach growl

"No"

"Ohh, give a bloke a break, why don'cha? Ya think this position is easy? My hands are turnin' bloody purple!"

"And I care . . .?"

Spike thrashed and growled as well as he could, pulling against the ropes tying him to the tub and kicking his bound legs. It kinda looked like a really stupid dance move.

"Look you bloody bitch, all I want is ta be able to feel my own bloody arms, stop that disgustin' sound comin' from my stomach, and use the soddin' loo!"

"I'm a guy, dammit! And guys can't be bitches, okay? And, well, really, what do you want me to do about all that? I can't untie you, neither of us want me to hand feed you, and, well, you figure out for yourself why I can't help you in the, um, loo area. We just don't go there."

Spike looked furious, with a small dash of desperate on the side. "You _won't_ leave me like this. You _can't_."

And he couldn't really, could he? I mean Spike would just keep complaining and that just was not an environment where much TV zonage could happen.

And, well, even he had an extent to his own little brand of evil. And making proud adult-like people, even psycho evil not-really-people-people, wet their pants . . . well, it wasn't really on his to do list.

"Argh." Xander complained, running his hands through his short hair. Maybe he could call Giles at the school and ask him what to do. Did Giles have a cell phone? Maybe he should call through the school office?

But what good would calling Giles do? He'd probably just tell him to ignore Spike, make him wait. Probably say that Spike was lying and would kill him as soon as Xander got in range.

But, looking at Spike now, Xander could tell he wasn't lying. He would probably kill him, but he wasn't lying.

So to just leave him like this . . .

It would just be way too degrading. And he so wasn't going down that road.

So, decision made, he looked back up at Spike and said, "Look, I'll make you a deal. I'll untie your arms, get you out of the tub for private bathroom duty, and get you something to eat. All you have to do is not try and kill me. Deal?"

Spike looked surprised for a moment, before slipping into suspicious and shifting his hips.

"You gonna tie my arms up again afterwards?"

"Well, yeah, I kinda have to. But I won't tie them up to the tub like they are now if you'll be quiet. How's that?"

"It's crap. It's bloody boring in 'ere." His stomach gave a low grumble and Spike looked even more frustrated.

"Well, when your arms aren't tied up like that, the scenery will be a lot better."

Spike gave him an are-you-the-stupidest-person-on-this-planet-or-what?-look, then, laying on the sarcasm a little more than Xander thought was really necessary, said, "Of course. I'll getta stare at _another_ wall."

"Well, hey, you can stare at the ceiling too. And at the sink and . . . and the toilet. You'll be entertained for hours." Smile. Do not feel sympathy for the evil bloodsucker.

Who's not a bloodsucker right now.

But he'll be one later.

And he's still evil.

Spike glared and squirmed a little, frustrated, disgusted, and obviously getting more and more impatient.

Oh god, was he really going to say this?

"How about I tie you up on the couch? I guess you could watch TV with me." It's not like it ruined his plans or anything. There would still be TV. He was just going to be sharing a couch with someone who seriously wanted to kill him.

"You have to stay on your side of the couch, though. And you can't kill me." Loud squishy noise from the stomach.

Spike still looked suspicious but nodded just the same. "Alright."

"And are you going to really not try and kill me. Like really, really?"

Spike rolled his eyes. "Yes I 'really, really' promise not ta try an' kill ya."

"You have to promise that you won't successfully kill me too."

"I won't kill ya, alright? Could we jus' get on with this?" Squirm

Taking a deep breath, Xander approached the tub and started on the ropes.

He was so going to die.

* * *

Spike had honestly not believed the bint would untie him.

But there she'd gone and done it, and he'd been shocked.

Was she daft?

She had just untied his hands; and he knew he might not be at his best, and he might not have his feet, but he could still kill people.

Just one blow to her head and . . .

He squirmed and reminded himself to focus on the priorities of the moment. He could kill the twit after he'd gone to the loo and eaten something.

So, plan made, Spike started to push himself up . . .

Only to be pushed right back down.

What!

Angry, Spike scowled and reached up to grab the bitch.

She dodged the hand easily. "Hey, watch it! We agreed. No attempted or successful killing."

"We also agreed that I would be gettin' out o' this bloody tub."

She glared. "And I'm helping you out of it, aren't I?"

"Seems more like yer pushin' me back in." Stomach grumble

"Noo, I'm helping you. See?" She grabbed him by his armpits and attempted to lift him, supposedly onto the rim of the tub.

He was lifted maybe four inches before he was dropped, hitting his head on the water-spout. Glaring, he pushed her hands away and tried to get up by himself.

He couldn't do it. The rim was too high and his body was at the wrong angle to pull himself up.

Falling back into the tub once more, Spike's glare intensified, only growing more intense when his anger failed to call up his true face.

Distracted by this anger, Spike was unable to stop the girl from grabbing his legs and swinging them over the edge of the tub.

He ended up in an extremely uncomfortable position on his back. His head crammed to an almost painful angle by one tub wall, and his arse against the other, Spike snarled, "This is _not_ helping." Struggling to get his legs back in the tub, he kicked out at Xander's face.

In response, Xander pulled Spike's legs out further, so that his arse was on the edge of the tub, back arched awkwardly, and unable to really move.

"Yes it is. Those other ways weren't working, and maybe this one will." She bent his knees, "Now sit up." Working his stomach muscles, Spike pulled himself to a sit while Xander held him sturdy, pushing down hard on his legs.

He narrowed his eyes at her cheeky smile, "An' that was th' only other way, was it?"

"Yep!" Grabbing his arms firmly, she moved back and pulled him to a stand. Then, after making sure he was reasonably steady, she let go and moved quickly out of range.

Maybe she did have some sense after all.

"Now, you'll have to jump over to the toilet and sink by yourself. And when you're done in here you just keep on hopping to the living room. Don't bother trying to escape. Unless, of course, you're dying to go hopping around outside, where everyone can see your bunny impersonation, and give me a chance to practice my football tackle. You wouldn't be movin' that fast, so I should be able to catch up."

Bitch

"I'll be in the kitchen hunting us both up some food; it's time for a snack anyway. Have fun!" And then she was gone, door closing behind her.

He'd been wrong.

She obviously didn't have a lick of sense, what with trusting him alone like that.

This room was full of potential weapons and she made a prime victim after putting him through that embarrassing scene in the tub then mocking him.

Though, he looked down at his feet, killing would be a little difficult like this, wouldn't it? The Slayer had tied his thighs and ankles much too good, knots where he couldn't reach without falling on his face and tied too tight for him to loosen easily.

She'd move a foot and he'd fall over.

Pathetic

Giving a disgusted sigh, he made a little test hop.

Then, secure in the knowledge that he wasn't going to fall arse over tit, he set to business.

A little while later Spike sat slouched on the couch, remote in hand, flipping furiously through the channels.

That had been disgusting.

He had forgotten how gross those natural human processes were, and he was not looking forward to experiencing any more.

And then having to hop from there to the couch like a bloody idiot . . .

The remote gave a protesting crack as he tightened his grip.

He hated this.

There had been a mirror in there too.

He had felt like a nancy boy, trying to avoid it, as if he was afraid of his own reflection.

He wasn't afraid. He just didn't feel like dealing with that at the moment.

"Hey. What are your feelings on turkey sandwiches? Because that's what we're eating." The bint was back, handing him a plate of food and flopping down on the opposite side of the couch. "It's the only thing I recognize and can actually make. Someone's gonna have to talk to that man about this vegetable and grain obsession he has. Swingin' bachelors are supposed to survive on pizza and Chinese take-out, not wheat-germ spread or whatever that nasty stuff was." She seemed to consider this for moment. "But then I guess the Giles swing days are long gone, aren't they? Now he'd have to be a leisurely walking bachelor or something, huh?"

He turned to her, ignoring the plate of food in his lap. What the hell?

"You're watching the History channel?"

What? He turned to look at the telly.

Oh. There, on the screen, an ugly old bird nattered on about some African tribe dying of AIDS or the tsetse virus or something. Not a drop of good blood or violence in it.

But, eh, it was better than all the other trash on at this time of the day.

He dropped the remote at his side, trapped between his thigh and the arm of the couch where no one could steal it, and looked down at his plate. "There's nothin' good on."

"I don't even want to know what you call good TV. Let me try." She put out a hand as if he would actually hand over the remote.

"No" Lifting the top bread slice, he looked at the uncovered cheese.

He was able to name a good amount of human foods, and actually had a few favorites, but he'd never actually eaten that much. Too much solid food wasn't good for the system.

"What? Excuse me, but who was it who let you come out here?"

He looked at the piece of bread in his hand. Was that mayonnaise? He'd never tried that before. "I'm not watchin' those crap cartoons."

He looked back at his sandwich. A couple slices of cold white meat and two pickles. Was that turkey? He remembered turkey looking different. More like chicken.

"My cartoons are not crap. They're good. And besides, who cares what you want, anyways. You're our prisoner. And will you stop playing with your food and just eat it already. I thought you were hungry."

Spike removed the pickles, put the bread back on, and took a large bite.

It wasn't too bad.

"Happy?"

"Overjoyed. Now give me the remote."

Chewing calmly, Spike gave the girl a bored look, "No."

Frustrated, she glared at him, hands clenching her plate, but didn't move. After a few seconds, she turned back to her sandwich and took an angry bite. Through a mouthful of food, she mumbled, "Well fine then."

Spike smirked.

* * *

God, Spike was such a bastard.

Here Xander was, making Spike lunch, giving him a little freedom, letting him watch TV. And it wasn't like he was expecting Spike to say thanks or anything, but he could at least give him the remote. The jackass wasn't even watching anything.

And he was being all smug about it, too. Like hogging the remote was some great evil.

Well, let him hog the remote. As soon as he finished that sandwich, the ropes were going back on.

Spike probably thought Xander was an idiot, what with the return of his arms. But Xander was fully aware of the danger he had put himself in. He hadn't realized until after he'd done it, but he did realize.

So, while making their lunches Xander had shoved one of Giles' more dangerous knifes, with a makeshift cover, into the back of his khakis. His pants were tight around his . . . hips on loan, so it was a reasonably sturdy place to store weapons as long as he didn't move much.

And maybe some of Spike's psycho-ness had rubbed off on him when they had touched, but Xander was really looking forward to using that knife.

As it was, it was a little after 3:30 and reruns of the Ninja Turtles came on at 4:00.

That was more than enough time for Spike to finish the sandwich and be forced back into the ropes.

He could deal with African documentaries for a little while.

Just for a little while though. And then ropes. And threatening.

The Xand-man would win in the end.

"Oi, get me a drink."

If the Xand-man didn't jump the bastard and get himself killed.

Why had he let Spike out of the bathroom again?

* * *


	3. A Short Escape

Still don't own anything

* * *

Chapter # 3: A Short Escape

A half hour of the bloodless documentary later, his attention more on his apparent guard and escape, Spike swallowed the last bit of his sandwich and immediately found a rather large kitchen knife pointed at his face.

Needless to say, it was a bit of a shock.

Apparently his guard had been paying him more attention than he'd thought.

And just when did she get that bloody knife? Had she had it the whole time?

Staring at the blade inches from his nose, Spike cursed his situation for not the last time that day. If he had still been a fucking vampire he would've _known_ she wasn't as relaxed as she'd seemed. He wouldn't have been taken by surprise.

"Alright, you're done eating, so now it's back into the ropes you go."

Shaking away his surprised thoughts, Spike leaned back into his seat and gave the bird behind the blade a truly irritating smirk. "Right. And 'ow's that little thing supposed ta make me do anythin'. Even if ya _could_ threaten' an' torture me inta putting on th' ropes, I couldn' do it. An' ya need two 'ands to tie ropes, so yer gonna have ta put down yer little toy there an' leave yerself defenseless if yer gonna be the one doin' th' tying."

"I . . . er . . ." Spike leaned his head back a bit more as Xander waved the knife around a bit, starting to look a little unsure.

"Tell me. Did ya think this plan through _at all_?"

"Of course I did," she lied, "And I just happen to be really good at tying people up while holding pointy objects."

"Really? That's kinky, luv" Spike leered, running his eyes down her shapeless, ridiculously clothed form. This just might work for him. "An' I suppose ya get good practice with that while keepin' yer bitch in line, too, huh?"

Eyes widening, she took a step back. "Wha—

In a sudden movement, taking advantage of this momentary distraction, Spike lifted his bound legs and kicked out at Xander's stomach. The girl fell, landing hard on her back, losing her breath and knife in the process.

Standing with care, Spike hopped over as quickly as possible to push Xander back down as she started to make it to her feet. This overbalancing him a bit, he let himself fall forward to land hard, kneeling, on the girl's stomach. Her breath gone once more, and unable to get much air into her lungs with Spike's full weight resting on her stomach, Xander, nevertheless, made a few token struggles. But these were easily avoided and ignored as Spike dealt a hard blow to her head, knocking her out.

Minutes later, Spike was free of his bindings and kneeling over Xander's unconscious body with knife in hand.

Positioning the knife over her heart, intent on a quick kill then escape, he raised his arm and . . . paused.

Lowering the knife, he gave the body a confused look. The girl laid silent, chest slowly rising and falling with breath, and looking more vulnerable and small in her ocean of baggy clothes than he had imagined she could while she was awake and talking.

Then he looked at his knife. He could already see the blood, a dark and beautiful red dripping down the blade and forever staining the carpet. It would be rich, delicious and fulfilling after that bland sandwich, and he was still hungry.

Then he turned to the body again. He could already see the puncture holes from his fangs, her slightly tanned skin fading to a sickly pale as the blood left her body, cold and dead . . .

But he didn't have fangs, didn't need the blood, and . . . and that really needed to be fixed.

He turned to look behind him at the door.

He didn't know what was happening, but . . . he didn't want to kill this girl.

There was no real reason as to _why_ he didn't. He just . . . didn't.

For the first time in more than a century, he was hesitant to kill, and so he was confused.

Spike would say it was because he was human at the moment. That, because he didn't need her blood to survive, there was no reason he _should_ kill her.

But that didn't really make sense. He had killed humans without feeding off them before. Vampires didn't just kill to eat, after all. They killed because it was fun or advantageous to them in some way.

And this . . . this little girl was his _prey_. His _enemy_. A loved one of a bloody _Slayer_.

He should be dragging her off to his lair to be tortured and destroyed, to be used as Slayer bait. He should be relishing her screams of pain and terror, shagging Dru in pools of her blood.

He _shouldn't_ be having second thoughts about quickly sticking a knife in her heart as she lay defenseless. Compared to what he should do, and what he normally would do, that was being merciful.

So why couldn't he do it?

Once accepting that he was human, for awhile at least, he had feared that a soul had come with the package. But that thought had died when it became clear he wasn't feeling any different than normal. There was no overwhelming guilt, no desire to abandon Dru and fight the 'good' fight, no pressing need to go to church and pray for the forgiveness of his sins.

So, logically, it _couldn't_ be a soul that was keeping him from killing.

Maybe it was just some instinctive feeling of connection to the bint due to them being the same species?

But, well . . . that didn't really make sense either.

Sharing a species had never seemed to stop all those other humans from killing each other. And it had certainly never stopped Spike from killing other vampires.

Finally, shaking his head, Spike decided to just forget the girl.

Right now, Spike wanted only one thing—to see Dru.

She was probably worried about him by now and he needed to make sure that the bloody stupid minions of this town had kept her from hurting herself.

He also needed her to cure him before this human-thing became any worse. As it was, he as already starting to go . . . funny.

And so, disgusted with himself but decided on a plan of action, Spike walked out the door.

* * *

When Xander came to, he was lying comfortably on a large bed in what he assumed was Giles' bedroom. 

The last thing he remembered was being unable to breathe, Spike's pointy knees and weight pushing down hard, and a hard blow to his head. So he must have been knocked out.

And the others must have finally returned from school and found him lying on the floor, Spike nowhere to be found.

Which meant that, right now, Buffy was probably out searching for Spike, who had escaped due to Xander's own idiocy, while Giles and Willow sat in the living room researching the newest fuck-up in the long line of Xander fuck-ups.

Which meant that Xander had to get his ass out of bed and go help, headache from hell or not.

Groaning, Xander pulled his body up to sit on the edge of the bed. Then, slowly, he stood and started to make his way toward Giles' small bathroom, aspirin being a decidedly necessary thing.

His body had really been through far too much, in far too short a time, and his new bruises really weren't helping.

A short time later, aspirin found and taken, he dropped onto the couch next to Willow with a soft "Hey."

Just as he'd predicted, Buffy was nowhere to be found, and Giles and Willow were surrounded by books.

"You're up!" Willow turned to him with a smile, ignoring her book to give him her total attention. "Are you okay? Do you need any anything?" From his own seat, Giles put his glasses back on and sat up, looking concerned.

"Nahh. I'm good. I've already taken some Advil. " Xander replied easily, reaching out to grab a book lying on the small coffee table in front of him. "So what are we looking for?"

"Xander, you should really be resting," Giles said, still looking concerned. "We would completely understand if you didn't help with the research."

"But I'm fine!" Xander looked over at Giles. "Really! I've never felt better."

Neither Giles nor Willow looked convinced.

"Well, alright, my head's about beat itself off my neck and my stomach is now the proud owner of a bruise the size of Denmark, but it's not like researching is really gonna involve me doing anything all that physical. All I'm gonna do is sit here and read, maybe walk around the table to get a book or something. And besides, this is _my_ problem you're researching, so I deserve to get to research it too." And with that said, Xander opened his book and pointedly began to read. Normally he'd be happy at the prospect of getting out of research, especially as he really didn't feel that great, but, as he'd said, this was his own problem. It wouldn't be fair for Giles and Willow to do all the work while he did nothing, especially when it was his own fault for being cursed. And besides, the more people researching, the quicker all of this girl-stuff would be over.

Giles took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Well, I-I don't think we will be finding anything actually useful in these books anyways. They're really only here for my, er, own interest; all of the . . the more useful books are back at the library. And besides that, we won't have a clue as to what we should be looking for until Buffy returns with Spike. Willow and I were merely going through these books in the blind hope of accidentally stumbling upon an answer to pass the time."

Seeing Willow shrug and nod in agreement, Xander let out a disappointed, "Ohh . . ." Then he shrugged himself and closed his book, deciding not to say anything about Spike and his escape unless they asked. He didn't need them to tell him how stupid he had been, releasing Spike's arms and letting him into the living room, or to give him those painful looks of disappointment. Xander knew full well that he had just been lucky Spike had, for some reason, decided not to kill him. He wondered if Giles had noticed his missing knife yet.

"Well, okay. When do you think Buffy'll be back?"

"She should be here soon," Willow answered with a quick glance in the direction of the door. "She's been gone for a really long time."

"Really?" Xander asked and Willow nodded. "What time did you guys show up, anyways?"

"Uh . . ." Willow looked at her wristwatch. "I think it was around 4: 30."

"I wasn't on the floor for that long, then," he said, mostly to himself, and ran a hand through his hair. Then, half-heartedly twisting to see the wall clock behind him, he asked, "What time is it now?"

"Almost 7."

"Seven?" He looked out the window. It _was_ getting kind of dark. "Why didn't you guys wake me up sooner?"

"Well, there wasn't really any need," Giles said, "I mean, you-you've been through quite a bit these past two days and, well, quite frankly, we all thought you could, ah, use the rest."

"The rest? But I don't _want_ the rest. Rest can—"

"Oh look!" Willow exclaimed, cutting in. "Buffy's back."

"Really!" Xander whipped around to see that Buffy was, in fact, back, and dragging a strangely awake but not struggling or talking Spike along behind her.

Stopping just to the side of the couch he and Willow sat on, Buffy smiled and pushed Spike none too gently in front of her. "Yep. One Slayer and prisoner reporting for duty."

"Ah, good . . ." Giles stood to pass Buffy the long length of rope that he had apparently being keeping near-by. "If you could please tie him up again."

"Sure," Buffy said, already grabbing Spike's arms to quickly tie. "Where should I put him?"

Moving out of the way, Giles motioned toward his seat, and Buffy immediately dragged the still silent Spike over and pushed him into the seat. Xander expected, any minute, for Spike to burst into a sudden flurry of violence and insults, but Spike just sat there, silent. He didn't seem to even realize where he was or that he had just been re-tied.

And Xander just had to wonder what had happened to him, going from his normal loud and evil self to this in such a short period of time.

* * *

Spike was confused and in shock. 

He would try to push the feelings down and away, but that would mean becoming overwhelmed with depression—something he didn't plan on doing until he could find enough alcohol to sink a ship—so he stuck with them.

Drusilla was missing and he couldn't find her.

He couldn't find her and he was still human.

And he needed alcohol. Lots and lots of alcohol.

After leaving the Watcher's place, he had gone immediately to the abandoned factory that he and Dru had set up base in for the moment only to find the place empty.

All of the minions were gone despite the remaining daylight, which didn't bother him, and there was no sign of Dru, which did.

The worst part was that she had obviously not just stepped out too early for a meal. All of her belongings, everything that she carried with her on their travels, were gone.

Her tea sets and dolls, her dresses and cards, her music box and toys . . .

He didn't understand it.

Had she finally stepped out to dance in the sun as she so often tried to do, forcing the minions to run away to escape his wrath and take her things with them?

Had the stars, Miss Edith, a bloody rock told her to move to another factory in Sunnydale?

Had she just plain moved on, leaving him behind again?

And without his usual senses, he couldn't even tell how long ago she had gone, much less track her down.

Shocked, confused, depressed, and frantic, he found himself sitting on a park bench, too lost in thought to really notice or even care about the arrival of the Slayer and his subsequent kidnapping.

Now he found himself back at the Watcher's place, re-tied and vaguely listening to the Slayer and her minions talking around him. Knowing better than to be vulnerable in the presence of enemies, Spike forced himself to pay attention.

The dark haired bird he'd been unable to kill sat on the couch off to his side, looking at him with wide, curious eyes. "Where'd you find him?"

"He was just sitting on a bench in the park." The Slayer shrugged. "It's so weird. He didn't try to fight me at all, just stared into space the whole way here. Hasn't even really said anything, just "Oh, you" when he noticed I was there."

"Yes . . ." The Watcher stood in front of Spike, watching Spike as though he were some sort of strange science experiment. "He is acting rather odd, isn't he?"

The redhead looked worried. "Is that bad?"

"Well let's hope not." The older man frowned, and then moved to snap his fingers a few times in Spike's face.

Scowling in annoyance, Spike batted the hand away and looked up with a glare. "Wot?"

The man's face was serious. "We have a few questions for you." Of course they did.

"About th' amulet," Spike said, seeing no point in lying and too emotionally tired for pretending ignorance.

"Yes," the Watcher nodded, "We would very much like to know what it is and its trigger. Is it safe to touch?"

Spike slowly shook his head, starting to feel better as he realized that this could work for him. "No"

"No what?" The Slayer narrowed her eyes. "No you won't tell us, or no we can't touch it?"

Ignoring her, Spike kept his attention on the man in front of him and asked, "Wot will ya give me if I tell ya?" If he was cured he could go find Dru.

At this the Slayer straightened, hands making fists. "We won't kill—

"What would you like?" the man asked calmly.

"What? Giles? You can't be—" He cut her off with a look.

Spike watched this, inwardly smirking at the display. "I don' wanna be human. If you'll cure me, I'll tell ya all I know."

"Very well."

"An' I don' wanna spend th' whole bloody time in these bleedin' ropes," Spike quickly added. He could already feel his rope burn from last night protesting the rope's return.

"I'm afraid you will just have to become accustom to those. Even though human, and weaker, you are still dangerous."

Spike scowled, caught between the enjoyment of still being seen as dangerous and the indignity of being tied up by humans. "I didn' kill that 'lil bird ya stuck guardin' me."

Acknowledging this, the man nodded once more. "We'll see."

"Right" Spike shifted in his seat, not believing him for a moment, and was suddenly much more grateful for the chair he sat in. He did _not_ want to be stuck in that bloody uncomfortable and cold tub ever again. "So wot exactly do ya wanna know?"

The Watcher leaned back against the arm of the couch he stood in front of. "What it is shall be fine for the moment."

"Right." Spike rolled his eyes. "It's called th' Eye of T'rambilk. Got it from some Wrenix traders; said it's old Egyptian or sumthin' similar, triggered by lookin' at th' eye straight on, an' meant ta make th' person who looked at it physically weak." Spike sneered. "Obviously, they were lyin'."

"Quite," the man said, looking deep in thought. "I'll need my books from the library of course, but this is a good start."

"We're starting tomorrow right?" The redhead looked up at the man, finally tearing her worried gaze away from the dark-haired bird next to her. He wondered what she seemed so worried about.

"Of course, of course," he said, and they all turned away to work on other business, ignoring him again. Spike could hear them making plans for tomorrow, for his storage, for what to tell someone named Xander's parents.

But that one bird, the dark one, stayed focused on him, her eyes seemingly searching for something.

Finally, she asked, "Did they say how long this amulet thing lasted? How it's cured?"

"Wot's it matter?" he sneered, "They were lyin' 'bout wot it did, so they were probably lyin' about that too." Hopefully.

There had, of course, been that stray thought he refused to acknowledge on how humans were naturally physically weaker than vampires.

"What did they say?"

Her eyes were strangely intent and he found himself answering without really meaning to. "They said it was permanent."

* * *


	4. The Quest For Knowledge

Disclaimer: see earlier pages

* * *

Chapter # 4: The Quest for Knowledge

Xander and the others, not Spike, had been in the library almost every day since that Friday night, searching through books and the internet for anything even remotely related to the situation.

The Eye of T'rambilk, cursed jewel amulets, Egyptian/Ethiopian/Ecrustian/European/African curses, gender-switching, dramatic dead-back-to-life healing, weakening curses and spells, sight based curses, necromancy, demon legends, demon exorcism, demonic objects, how jewels can affect auras and individuals . . .

The Watcher's Council had been called, but refused to help on the grounds that Xander was in no way supernatural and so not in their field of interest, Spike having not been mentioned for the general good of everyone involved.

The Wrenix traders had been searched for but not found.

And the day before, Giles had begun to call his own contacts but, so far, hadn't found anything.

By that next Friday, they were out of ideas of where to look and had started to get a little desperate.

Well, Xander, Spike, and Giles had started to get a little desperate. Besides their general concern for Xander and desire to be rid of Spike, Buffy and Willow didn't really seem to understand just what was so bad about the situation. Buffy had even wanted to drag Xander to the mall and play dress-up.

And he was so bored that he almost let her, if only to get out of the library and away from all books in general.

Not being able to go to school, and not wanting to spend his days watching TV on the couch with Spike, Xander had been basically living in the library, where he spent most of his time staring blankly into space, doing the make-up work Willow would pick up for him, or researching.

He was bored out of his mind, his ass was numb, every single one of his joints ached, and his headache might as well have taken up residence because it was _not_ going away.

He was also starting to smell _bad_.

Xander had been successfully ignoring the entire concepts of showering and changing clothes. He hadn't been able to ignore the other functions of the bathroom for very long, unfortunately, but with a lot of carefully placed denial, he had been surviving.

Willow and Buffy thought he was being disgusting and, more than once, they had actually almost gotten him to shower and change. But, luckily, once he was in the bathroom, away from their pouting and puppy-dog eyes, he would always come back to his senses.

Xander was a guy. Maybe not the most masculine guy, and maybe not currently of the normal guy-shape, but, in the end, still a guy.

And, as a guy, he could live happily in the same outfit, without a shower, for days.

Besides, it wasn't like there was some dire need. He hadn't been doing much, so he never got very dirty or sweaty.

But it had now been a week. Buffy and Willow had taken to pointedly sitting at different tables than him, Giles was threatening to not let him in the house, Xander had never felt so greasy, and there still wasn't a cure in sight.

So Xander took a shower.

A very quick shower, with his eyes shut and as little soaping and touching as possible while still feeling cleaned.

Then, getting out of the shower, he'd had to dry himself off with a towel. With all the horrible rubbing, and touching, and seeing, and feeling that came with that.

And he had thought that it couldn't get worse than that, which was actually really stupid, now that he thought about it.

Before the shower, Xander had given his dirty clothes to Giles to throw in the washer and had been told that Giles would leave some of his own old clothing by the door so that Xander wouldn't have to wait for his clothes to dry in a towel.

But, when reaching out for these clothes, Xander had found a pair of jeans and a T-shirt that might have fit Giles at 14, if 14 yr-old Giles had been a little girly. The accompanying underwear, filling his head with dirty, _nasty_, images, was immediately thrown away, smacking the mirror and landing in the sink, with a very-manly-and-_not_-girly shriek.

Even just remembering it made Xander shudder. The _images_.

Buffy had, apparently, not agreed with his and Giles' clothing-plan. Had actually come over to Giles' house (after they had finished that day's research and under the guise of wanting to pick up something she'd forgotten there), just to force Xander into the shower and new clothes she'd bought him.

And she wouldn't let him out until he did.

Inevitably, he caved, leading up to now, with Xander sitting in the library the next day, smelling and feeling relatively clean, wearing clothes fit relatively well, periodically rolling his shoulders and making weird faces.

Bras were _annoying_.

"Giles?"

"Yes, Willow?"

"I, uh . . . I might have found something . . ."

"Really?" Giles asked, walking to her side.

Buffy and Xander looked up from their books, interested but not with much hope. This wasn't the first time one of them had thought they had found something, and the jumping up excitedly was tiring.

"Um . . ." Willow paused as she quickly reread, "Well . . . it _mentions_ the Eye of T'rambilk . . ."

"Nothing else?"

She shook her head, "Nothing that we didn't know already," shot Xander an apologetic look from her seat across the table, "Sorry."

Xander smiled slightly, slouching at the table and head resting in a hand. "It's okay, Wills."

"Except for this one thing," she continued, trying to stay positive, "which isn't really a cure, but _could_ possibly, maybe, lead to one. I think."

That was new.

He sat up a bit. "Really?"

Giles looked interested too and motioned towards the book. "If I may . . .?" Nodding, Willow pushed the book over, allowing Giles to pick it up and quickly scan the page.

And he started to nod with a contemplative, "Hmmmm . . ."

"And for the rest of the class?" Buffy asked, "What's it say?"

"Hmm?" Giles looked up from the book to notice Buffy and Xander's curious expressions. "Oh, oh, yes, quite." He cleared his throat. "Well, basically it-it tells us exactly what Spike has already mentioned and what we have already deduced ourselves—the curse is triggered by looking into the Eye and the effects are random. But it also mentions a, ah . . ."—squint—"Dr. Nicholas Russell, who has apparently studied the Eye of T'rambilk extensively. Most likely, he has also written down his discoveries somewhere."

"So we find his books and we find the cure?" Willow asked.

"Well . . ." Giles hesitated, ". . . yes," Giles turned back to the book and away from the faces of the three teenagers, "I suppose."

"Alright!" Xander grinned and slapped the table, ignoring the last bit of Giles' answer. "Then let's get that book down here and start with the curin'."

At this Giles looked back up, obviously uncomfortable. "Xander . . . I . . . well, I . . . I'm afraid that I don't have anything by that, ah, particular author."

"You don't? I mean, I know we've already been through most of the library, but . . ."

Giles shook his head.

"You sure?"

Giles nodded.

"Really, _really_, sure?

Another head nod.

"You couldn't have . . . just, maybe, forgotten about it?"

Giles shook his head.

"It couldn't just, maybe, be really small, and . . . and hidden behind some other books? Way in the back? Maybe with some those non-Hellmouthy-type books that we don't look at?"

Another head shake

"You sure? That corner in the way-back is lookin' pretty dusty."

Giles placed the book back on the table. "Xander . . . I'm sorry, but I do not have that book. I've never even heard of a Dr. Russell."

And he really did look sorry.

Xander sighed, slumping down in his chair in disappointment. "No . . . it's . . . it's fine. . ."

"I'll have to continue calling some of my-my contacts and see if . . . if they've ever heard of him . . ."

"Oh . . ." Xander stared at the table. ". . . And how long do you think this is gonna take?"

"It's . . . well . . ." Giles focused his attention on cleaning his glasses, "to-to find it . . . and, well, there may be mailing, and . . . and we're not-not even, um, positive, that thi-this book will even, ah, have the . . . the cure." He paused in his cleaning. "We should probably see about telling your . . . your parents . . . maybe see if you can somehow continue going to, er, school in the duration."

His parents?

"Giles," Xander looked up from the table to focus on Giles' downward facing face. "How long is this gonna take? A month? A year? I'm not . . . I'm not gonna be going to the Senior Prom in a _dress_, am I?"

"Well, I don't quite know at the moment, but-but I'm quite sure that you will not be, as you say, going to the-the Senior Prom in a dress."

"Yeah," Buffy nodded from her seat to his right, adding, in an attempt to be helpful, "And you don't _really_ have to wear dresses if you don't want to. Girls wear pants all the time."

Xander shook his head. "Buff—

"I'm actually wearing some right now." She continued then turned in her seat and stuck out her left leg in his direction, so as to, apparently, model her pants. "See?"

"And their very nice, but—

"Aren't they? I got them on sale too. 30 off."

"Buffy, that's really _not_ the point." His voice a little sharper than he had intended.

"Well, I'm just saying that . . . that, you know, it won't be that bad. And I'm sure it won't take that long . . ."

Buffy looked a little hurt, and Xander immediately felt like scum. "I know, and I appreciate it, really, I just . . ." He looked sadly down at the table again, "I just want my dick back, okay?"

"Well, yeah, but . . ." She trailed off, looking uncomfortable.

"But," Willow broke hesitantly, "well . . . is being a girl really that bad?"

"What?" He looked up at her in shock, "Of _course_ it is! In case you haven't noticed I'm not normally a girl!

"Oh, no, no, I noticed. I just mean, I'm a girl and I'm fine. And, well, I know that's not quite the same thing, because, you know, this is a change, but it, it could've been a lot worse, you know? You could've gotten sick or started looking really icky, or, or, you know, go all evil. And being evil is definitely bad."

"Yes, Xander," Giles said, "You really were quite fortunate in that aspect. This situation could have become much, much worse."

"But . . ." Xander trailed off then sighed and nodded.

Damn them and their right-ness

"So it's a for sure thing that all this curse did was make him a girl?" Buffy asked, glancing at Xander in concern, but addressing Giles. "That's it? It's done? No waking up tomorrow as a fish, or something?"

Xander looked at her with wide eyes then quickly turned to Giles, hoping desperately for an answer that would make him happy.

"I . . ." Giles looked stumped. "I don't know."

Shit

* * *

Almost a half hour later, mostly spent grilling Xander on his general state of well-being, Giles and Xander stood on the front steps to Xander's house. Buffy and Willow had both gone home, either to prepare for patrol or do homework, leaving Giles and Xander with the duty of informing Xander's parents about his condition.

Giles had never been to Xander's house.

Truthfully, after seeing Buffy and Giles' nice and comfortable upper-middle class homes, Xander found his house kind of embarrassing. It wasn't that he was dirt poor, living in a trailer park on the edge of town; his house was just kinda run-down and dirty.

The green paint was cracked and old in places, the front lawn half-dead and uncut. Off to the side, a long line of full-to-the-brim trash cans stood next to numerous recycling bins overflowing with empty bottles of booze.

Obviously nobody had remembered to take either the trash or recycling out to be collected that week. That was normally his job.

Then again, most things were normally his job.

"So, you have this all planned out, right? Cuz I gotta say, I've got a big, fat, nothin'," Xander looked up at Giles, attempting to stall and carefully ignoring the wiggy feeling of actually _having_ to look up. He really didn't want to go inside.

Thankfully, he knew his father wouldn't be home until midnight, it being Wednesday as thus bar night. But his Mom was probably home, and he wasn't so excited to explain to her the wonderful secret life of her son.

"And somehow I don't think the 'rents are gonna take this without some hardcore proof. Which, as you may have noticed, we don't really have."

"Well, I must say," Giles, in his nice tweed and extreme British-ness, looked extremely awkward and out of place standing there before a backdrop of dead grass and flies. "I'm not quite sure what to say either."

"So we're gonna wing it." Xander nodded, rolling his shoulders and cracking his neck as though pumping himself up for a hard fight. "Good plan."

Then he opened the door.

The living room was a pigsty, empty bottles of booze and cans of beer littering every available horizontal service. His parents' coats lay abandoned on the old carpet, which was decorated with stains coming in a variety of sizes and colors. Old _Cosmopolitan_, _Home Improvement_, and _Good Parenting_ magazines were carefully stacked below the side tables and on the floor next to his mom's discarded shoes, while a rug, baring a large stain from Dad's last time hosting a guy's-only poker night, lay behind the couch, put down in a vain attempt to make the place look just a little bit nicer.

And in middle of it all was his mom, lying asleep on the couch, still dressed in her nurses' uniform. Her latest beer lay on floor, most likely having fallen from her grasp after she had fallen asleep drinking it.

His mom worked crazy, long, hours at the Sunnydale Hospital. And, as this was Sunnydale, this meant she worked _hard_ and saw some pretty bad things.

He couldn't remember a time when she wasn't tired or stressed, especially since Dad expected her to do all the housework, errands, and child-raising on top of her already hellish schedule.

So when she started drinking, sometime around the middle 5th grade, Xander couldn't really blame her.

"Mom?" He called, absently waving Giles in as he walked over to the couch to lightly shake her shoulder. "Mom?"

Slowly, his mom's eyes fluttered open, and, upon seeing Xander, a slightly drunken smile crossed her face. "Alex?" She raised a heavy hand to clumsily pet his hair. "Did you have fun at your little friend's house?"

Xander smiled, head bobbing a little with the weight of her hand. "Yeah Mom."

"That's good, honey," she blinked heavy eye-lids, "Are you hungry? I think I have some money in my purse . . . You could call for pizza."

"Actually, Mom, I have someone I want you to meet."

"Oh . . ?" She raised her head a little and gave him a somewhat dazed, questioning look.

"He's from school. Do you think you could sit up?"

"Of course, honey . . ." She said and began to slowly move into a sitting position. Xander sat down next to her, allowing her to lean against him as he called out for Giles, still standing awkwardly in the doorway.

"Hey G-man! C'mon in, already. You can sit in Dad's chair." He waved a hand in the direction of the faded blue armchair to the left of the couch.

"Ah . . . right." Giles said, closing the front door and walking forward. Xander noticed that he was very careful to avoid staring rudely around the room.

Meanwhile, his mom was staring, confused, at Xander's chest, which, in her new position, she had become much closer to. Clumsily, she reached out to give Xander's left breast a hard poke.

Xander flinched back. "Ow, Mom. Don't do that."

Sitting up a bit straighter as she began to wake up a little more, she looked at Xander with confused eyes. "Alex?"

Slightly clearer eyes catching the differences in her son's face, she reached out again to feel. "Honey? What . . . what's going on? Are you . . ." Her eyes ran up and down her son's body and face again. "You _are_ Alexander, right?"

And _ouch_. That hurt bad.

"Yeah Mom, I—

"What happened to your voice?"

"I . . . I . . . Look Mom, that's what Giles is here to talk to you about. You remember Giles, don't you? The school librarian?" He directed her attention over to where Giles was carefully sitting on the edge of his dad's old armchair.

"What's going on?"

"Now, Mrs. Harris, I . . . I'm afraid that wh-what I am about to tell you may come as a bit, a bit of a, er, shock."

"My little boy isn't dead, is he?"

Mom had a bit of a habit of jumping to the absolute worst conclusions. Especially when a bit tipsy.

"Wh-what? Oh no, no, of course not. I simply . . . well that is . . . It's a bit of a long story, I'm afraid."

"Tell me." By now she was sitting up completely under her own power, much more awake.

"W-well, okay—

Leaning a bit forward and waving a hand, she interrupted Giles before he could say another word to say, "Wait, wait. If this is gonna be as long or shocking as you say it is then we're gonna need some drinks." Pushing herself to her feet, only slightly unsteady, she continued, "What'd you like? I'll get some."

Standing himself, Xander gently pushed his mom back into her seat. "Why don't you just stay here and listen to Giles. I'll go get the drinks, okay?"

"I don't know . . ." And now she was looking at him suspiciously, but he ignored this and made his way into the kitchen.

Xander came back a few minutes later, 2 Coronas in hand, to catch the tail end of Giles' self-introduction and Watcher-explanation. As he sat down and handed his mom her drink, Giles moved on to an explanation of Slayers.

And so the explanation, broken only by random questions from Mom or helpful story-additions from himself, continued through the existence of the Hellmouth, on to a short summary of just what Xander had been doing for the past year, and coming to a close with a detailed rundown of recent events.

By the time Giles finished speaking; Mrs. Harris had stopped reacting, and was, instead, just kind of staring at him.

There was a moment of silence as both Giles and Xander awaited her reaction.

Then, slowly, she shook her head, looking at them in disbelief. "You . . . you actually expect me to believe this?"

"Well . . ." Xander shifted in his seat, avoiding his mother's eyes, ". . . yes?"

"Mrs. Harris," Giles leaned a bit forward, face full of understanding, "I understand that this may seem a bit, well, far-fetched, but—"

"_Far-fetched_? This is . . . this is. . ." she shook her head, clumsily getting to her feet, "It's unbelievable . . ."

"Well, yes, but—

"And for someone your age to play this kind of trick is just . . ." Glaring at Giles.

"Ma'am, I assure you that this is no trick."

Her face hardened. "Get out."

"What?" Xander looked up, "But, Mom—

"I said get out."

Giles stood. "If we were to show you proof—

"I'm calling the cops." Immediately heading for the phone.

"Wait!" Xander jumped up from the couch, holding up both hands, "We're going, we're going, okay?" quickly backing away, "Don't worry." Once past Giles, Xander turned around, grabbed his arm, and headed for the door.

"But Xa—

"Let's just go, okay?"

* * *

"No"

Giles sighed and put down his fork. "Spike . . ."

Having absolutely refused to let either Spike or Xander eat in his living room, the Watcher had come up with the absolutely ridiculous idea of "family" meal-time. Each morning and night he would cook, and each morning and night Spike, Xander, and Giles would gather around the Watcher's small table for breakfast and supper, Spike only behaving under the threat of being re-tied without any food.

Usually these meals would be almost silent, and vaguely awkward, except for the quickly silenced intermittent bouts of snark between Spike and Xander. That night though, Spike was to be informed of the events of the day.

Of the discovery of a possible book containing a cure.

And of the unknown amount of time it would take to _find_ said book.

He was, understandably, not taking the news very well.

"I'm _not_ sleepin' in tha' bloody chair waitin' fer yer lot ta get yer bloody fat heads outta yer bloody fat arses an' find tha' fuckin' book."

Sitting to his left, the Watcher clenched his teeth. "There is really nothing that I can do."

Spike ignored him, gesturing angrily with his own fork. "An' there is no bleedin' way in bloody '_ell_ that I'm gonna be fuckin' tied up fer another goddamned week of yer lot pansy-footin' around."

"Pansy-footing?" To his right, the bint looked up from her own meal, asking in a curious voice, just to annoy him, "And just how would someone pansy-foot?"

He ignored her, loudly announcing, "This is crap. You lot are useless."

Slamming his fork on the table, Spike got to his feet, and started for the door.

"And just where do you think you're going?" the Watcher asked mildly.

"Ta find my _own_ cure," Spike sneered back at him, "I don' need _you_."

"Oh really?" That wanker actually sounded almost amused.

"Yah," Spike nodded, glaring, "Don' know wot I was thinkin' comin' ta you lot."

"Well, actually, you didn't really come to us," Xander said, "Buffy sort of—

"Shut up" Spike snapped.

"And just where are you thinking of sleeping tonight?" the Watcher continued, ignoring the interruption. "Surely not your old lair."

Well, actually . . .

"An' why not?" Spike asked, instantly suspicious.

"Well, who knows what type of creature could stumble in while you were asleep."

He snorted. "Nobody would come in."

"Are you so sure of that?" Giles inclined his head in gentle question. "How do you even know that your lair hasn't already become home to another group of vampires?"

The factory as he had last seen it flashed in his mind, Dru's things missing and minion trash scattered throughout the building. The whole place empty and unguarded . . .

Oh bugger

He hadn't even thought . . .

And he had left all his stuff there, too. Now everything was probably destroyed or being used by some dirty minion.

And what was he going to do about clothes?

Great

Spike shook this thought away and scowled at Giles. "Then I'll find some place else."

"You would walk around the Hellmouth, purposely venturing into demon infested areas, at night?"

"Yah . . . ?" He did it all the time.

"As a human?"

Spike opened his mouth to reply . . . then paused as his brain sputtered to a stop, the full meaning of that question, and his situation, momentarily hitting him hard.

Right. He'd almost forgotten about that.

He wasn't a vampire at the moment.

He was human.

And therefore he was a . . . a food source?

"Well . . ." Spike struggled for a come-back as the Watcher just smirked at him smugly.

He was _food_?

His . . . his _own_ food?

Finally Spike just snarled, "_Fine_, you bloody bastard," and stomped back over to the table, throwing himself into his seat. "But, tomorrow," he said, "I'm leavin' fer sure," and glared at the bastard, just daring him to say otherwise.

"You probably shouldn't be telling us that," the bint commented from the side, probably purposely sounding as irritatingly helpful and cheerful as she could, "you know, what with us being your captors and all."

"No, no . . ." the Watcher said mildly, turning back to his food. "We should let him do as he wishes."

Spike gave him an angry nod of approval. "Right"

Things finally going his way, he turned back to his barely touched meal of corn, some white mush they called mashed potatoes, and a—recent realizations ran screaming through his head, and he barely refrained from letting a pained grimace cross his face—breast of chicken.

He _was_ that chicken.

He was his own food.

"And if he wishes to die a horrible death as a starving, cold, and dirty, homeless man on the streets, then, we should respect that."

"An' I would be dyin' a 'orrible death, starvin', dirty, an' 'omeless, because, wot?" his eyes narrowing, "You found sumthin' else on tha' curse tha' yer not tellin' me, didn' ya?"

"No," the man shook his head, amused again, "The only way in which the curse relates to your inevitable death on the streets, is simply to supply the chance." The Watcher paused to swallow a spoonful of corn, then continued in that same mild voice; "Humans, as a whole, tend to need things to stay alive and happy, such as warmth, a safe place to live and sleep, food, water . . ." he trailed off meaningfully and gave Spike a look. "_You_ have none of these things. Even worse, you have no ability to obtain them."

"'No ability to obtain them'?" Spike mocked, "You don' actually think I'm gonna _work_, do ya?"

"Of course not," Giles said, voice dry, "But, think, if you can. Do you honestly believe that you will even be _able_ to steal with your new limitations?"

"Uh huh," Xander agreed, nodding seriously, "Plus, there's the fact that I bet you don't even really know _how_ to be human."

"I don' know _'ow_ ta be 'uman?" Spike gave a derisive snort, inwardly grateful for the distraction. "Wot? You lot are comin' with instruction manuals now?"

That bloody _bastard_

What did he mean _limitations_?

"And _really_," she continued, as though he hadn't spoken, "Where are you gonna find a shower, anyways? And, hey," she looked up at him, "now that we're talkin' 'bout showers, I've gotta say, you really need one. You stink."

And this from the moron who had forced Spike to deal with, and sleep next to, his constant stench, for a _week_, because he didn't want to feel his own breasts.

Spike was unimpressed. "I _know_."

"Then why don't you just go take one? I mean, you're not leavin' til tomorrow, and you might as well start off your homelessness smelling good. It won't last long, but, hey," she shrugged, "it's a good start." Then, looking between each of her dinner companions, "And there's really no need for all this talking, right _now_, is there? Why don't we all just finish dinner, let Spike get unstinky, and go to sleep. Okay?" She nodded decisively before anyone could answer, "Good."

Bitch

Spike grit his teeth and looked down at his meal. Reluctantly, he grabbed his spoon and started in on the corn, barely refraining himself from grabbing his fork instead and shoving it in that bastards thigh.

Who did he think he was to speak like that to Master Vampire?

I mean really, _limitations_?

He was _human_ not crippled.

That disgusting piece of chicken was in his way, and he pushed it to the other side of the plate, far away from all his other food.

He wasn't limited.

* * *

TBC 


	5. Fathers Suck

Still don't own Buffy

And be warned, this chapter will include a tiny bit of stuff that could be considered slightly offensive to homosexuals, women, and the British.

* * *

Chapter # 5: Fathers Suck

"Oh, did I tell you that Cordelia asked about you?"

"What?" Xander looked up from his Algebra II homework and across the table at Buffy. "Me?"

"Well, not really asked, as in _asked_, but definitely wondering."

"You didn't actually _tell_ her, did you?"

"Nah, told her you're sick," Buffy said, chewing some gum, and looked off into space to seemingly consider this, "Don't think she totally believed me, though, so she might actually come to a meeting soon."

Xander sighed and slumped back into his seat. "Yay"

Because that was _just_ what he needed. Cordy mockage on top of the already more than plentiful Spike mockage, who, unfortunately, _hadn't_ decided to leave after all.

Noticing his expression, Buffy tried to make him feel better. "You don't have to, like, announce who you are when she's here, you know. I mean, it's not like she's gonna immediately think you're you."

And _Ouch_

He ignored Buffy's last sentence. "But she'll probably start to wonder when Giles starts with the demons and I'm not kicked out."

"True," Buffy allowed, absently curling a bit of stray hair behind her ear. "Maybe you can hide in Giles' office."

Here, Willow, sitting to his right, finally spoke up. "Or you could just not be there."

"What?" he looked over at her, "Wills, don't you want me?"

"Oh, I don't mean that in a _mean_ way. I just mean that-that if you _really_ don't want her to know then you could just kinda, you know, leave when she gets here."

Buffy nodded in agreement.

"But I _need_ to be here." He looked back and forth between the two girls, needing them to understand. "I can't just _leave_."

Buffy and Willow shared a concerned look.

They didn't understand.

"You can miss researching for one night, Xander. We're not even really doing anything anymore." Willow sounded like she was trying to calm a frightened animal and Xander would have felt insulted if he weren't so busy being strung out.

He shook his head. "No I can't."

"Yes, you can," Buffy said with her own version of the calming voice, "Just be somewhere not _here_."

"Yeah, but if I'm not here, I'm at Giles'. And if I'm at Giles', I'm with Spike. And if I'm with Spike, I'm not happy. And if I'm not happy, I eat. And all Giles has is boring health food and tea. _Lots_ and _lots_ of _tea_. It's just not _natural_."

It _wasn't_.

Willow blinked wary green eyes at him. "Have you been getting enough sleep?"

"Yeah . . ." Buffy nodded, "You sound kinda stressed."

Xander groaned and let his head fall onto his math book in frustration so that, when he spoke, his voice was muffled. "I've been sleeping, on a couch, for a week, only two feet away from a very pissed off Spike, the vampire psycho. Then I've been spending most of the day, when not here, on that same couch, still only two feet away from a very pissed off Spike. Me, the couch, and the very pissed off Spike have spent _way_ too much time together and need some time _alone_."

Sympathetic, Willow reached over to pat him on the back.

Buffy was a bit more caught up in other details. She frowned. "Isn't Spike all upward and mobile now?"

Xander nodded into his book as well as he could. "Yeah."

"And he's _still_ at Giles'?"

Removing his face from his book, Xander looked up at her with a shrug. "I guess so."

"And so what? Is Spike just gonna hang out in Giles' living room until we find a cure? 'Cuz that's kinda wiggy."

Xander shrugged again.

"What about your house?" Willow asked, probably finally remembering what Xander and Giles had gone to do yesterday. "How'd that go?"

"It, um . . . " Xander looked over at her and hesitated, "well, it went."

"Oh," Buffy looked at him in knowingly. "And by that you mean they freaked."

"They freaked?" Willow repeated. "They didn't really freak did they?"

"Well . . ." Xander shifted uncomfortably in his seat, "technically, _no_, they didn't. It, well . . ." he trailed off as the two girls continued to look at him.

Finally, he sighed. "They, well, weren't a they. Dad wasn't home," he shrugged, "so, Giles ended up just talking to Mom."

"And _she_ freaked?" Willow asked.

"Kinda, yeah. . . . she . . ." he shook his head, "she thought we were playing some kind of mean trick on her."

Willow tilted her head. "But you got her to realize that you weren't, right?"

"Nah . . ." Xander, looking down and avoiding the two girls' eyes, began to play with the pages of his math book. "Threatened to call the cops on us."

"Well then what about your dad?" Buffy asked, "Couldn't you talk to him?"

"Well . . . yeah, but . . . I gotta say Buff, don't think that'll do anything."

"Why not?"

"Uh, Dad is, um . . . ," Xander stuttered, frantically racking his brain for a Buffy-safe response, "Dad is very . . . anti . . . uh, anti-supernatural."

Yeah. That could work.

"Anti-supernatural," Buffy repeated flatly.

"Yeah, very," Xander nodded seriously, "Traumatic Halloween experience. Ghosts, witches, fairies . . . mention anything like that and he just freaks out. Goes total kablooey all over the room. And don't even get him _started_ on black cats."

"Oh I remember that!" Willow exclaimed, as though this parental quirk actually existed. "That thing with your neighbor and her cat?"

"Yeah!" Xander agreed, nodding empathetically.

"Yeah that was . . . that was really weird," she made a face, "and kinda icky."

God, he'd have to get Wills a present for this or something. Maybe a soda; he didn't have a lot of money.

Buffy looked curious. "What happened?"

"Oh you really _don't_ wanna know." Xander shook his head with wide eyes to show his sincerity. "_Really_"

"Yeah," Willow said in a small voice, sounding a little disgusted. "I wish I didn't know, either."

He felt kind of bad about lying to Buffy. But, still, while she may have become one of his best friends, he really hadn't known her that long and didn't want her caught up in his little family drama if he didn't have to. She had enough of her own problems without adding his into the mix.

"Okay . . ." Buffy said, giving them both a strange look before changing the subject. "Then . . . your mom. She doesn't have any strange . . . phobias about the supernatural, too, does she?"

"Nah, Mom's pretty okay with it."

"Then all you have to do is try again and convince her and you're off Giles' couch and away from Spike."

"And while that would _totally_ be of the good, I somehow doubt I could pull it off without Dad finding out. I figure even _he'd_ notice that I've shrunk about a foot and am carrying some excess baggage a little too far up in the front. This whole thing is doomed to failure," Xander shrugged, "but me and the G-man are gonna go try again tonight anyways."

And hopefully his dad would decide to stop over at the bar, or a friend's house, or maybe the grocery store for some munchies after work instead of coming straight home. Dad and the G-man _really_ didn't need to meet.

* * *

Spike sat in his chair, no longer tied up, and stared blankly at the commercials being played on the telly.

The Watcher had taken away the ropes last night, supposedly for good, having apparently made the decision sometime during their argument at supper. And Spike, yet again, didn't know what to do.

He was free.

He could leave. Could do whatever he wanted.

He could go find his own cure, go find Dru, go steal a busload of booze and get completely pissed . . .

Except for the fact that he couldn't.

None of his contacts would listen to a human.

He didn't have his senses or strength anymore so he couldn't force cooperation or sniff Dru out himself.

And how the hell was he supposed to steal bloody _anything_ while this weak and making this much noise?

Add to that having no clothes, no food, no money but what he could find around the Watcher's house, nowhere to go, an admittedly uneasy understanding of his new limits and needs, no idea as to where to start looking for either Dru or a cure, and being no longer safe to walk about at night.

He could essentially do whatever he wanted, but he couldn't do anything.

So he'd stayed at the Watcher's house. Right now, the white hats seemed to be his best bet at a cure.

The real problem was that now that he was untied, he could no longer trick himself into believing it was the ropes that kept him from going after Dru. That he actually _wasn't_ just sitting around his enemy's house watching the telly as Dru got further and further away.

Everything in him cried out that he should be doing something, _anything_, but sit about on his arse. But then he had absolutely no clue as to just what that something should be.

What _could_ he do?

It hadn't been so bad earlier, when that dark-haired bird-bloke had been around. Whether being confused by or fighting with, that one was a lovely distraction. She kept his mind too busy to be bothered by more serious thoughts.

He'd soon figured out that she was actually another victim of the curse, and, over the past week, Spike had been taking immense pleasure in mocking her about that. The only problem with this being that she gave as good as she got and Spike had to grudgingly admit she was quick.

And he knew he had been inside for _far_ too long when he started wishing a white hat would come keep him company.

Horrified at the very thought, Spike looked around the living room for something to distract him. Eyes catching on the bright sunlight peeking into the room from behind the curtains of the front window, he paused.

As it was no longer "safe" to walk about at night, Spike would, supposedly, need to do his walk-abouts in the daytime.

In the sun

He frowned, sitting up to closer consider the door.

He didn't really have any reason not to. And when he'd gone out before it had been getting on toward sun down and he hadn't really been paying attention to anything but getting back to the factory or Dru's disappearance.

That was probably the first step to doing anything productive. Going out in the sun.

He could start testing his new limits, pick some pockets, maybe find a bookstore to start doing a little bit of his own looking . . .

And, of course, there was the chance for new scenery.

If he was starting to think things like _that_ about the white hats . . .

He grimaced, shaking his head in disgust.

Mind made up, he stood, swiftly walking out the door and down the Watcher's shaded path with quick, determined strides. Coming to the end of these shadows, though, he paused, examining the contrast between the light and dark of the sun and shadows. In the back of his mind, over a hundred years of training, instinct, and experience screamed at him to get the hell out of there and back indoors, but he ignored them.

Schooling his face into a determined scowl, he took a large step forward and stopped.

Unconsciously wincing, he awaited being burned alive. A few tense seconds of nothing but pleasant warmth later, he relaxed a bit, looking around, at the sunlit greenery and pavement, at the rows of nice houses up and down the street, and at the relaxed humans going about their nice and normal lives.

Across the way, a lady wearing headphones and a pair of wristbands jogged by with a large dog. A couple houses down, an older man cursed at and kicked an overturned bin, garbage flowing out onto the pavement. Directly across the street a minivan, smiley face drawn on the back window in the dust, pulled into the driveway and two laughing children jumped out and raced into the house.

This was so bloody strange.

It was so peaceful.

So happy

Raising a hand to shield his eyes, Spike pushed his gibbering instincts to the back of his mind and squinted up into the clear blue sky at the sun. It hurt.

He'd forgotten just how bright that was.

With a disgusted sigh, Spike lowered his hand and turned back to the street.

Right. He hadn't come out here for a trip down memory lane.

He had business to do.

Choosing a random direction, Spike turned left and started walking, carefully blocking out his surroundings.

They were just too fucking weird.

It was too normal, too bright, too . . . open. Spike couldn't see a dark and shady alleyway or corner to lurk in _anywhere_.

And it was so _warm_. Pleasantly so, even

Spike couldn't remember the last time he had been this pleasantly warm. Maybe during the summers, or closer to the Equator, or in some of the Middle Eastern or African countries, but that was always a different kind of warmth, a warmth that always came with heavy humidity and strong odors.

There was a whole other dimension to this warmth that he couldn't quite put his finger on. Almost as though it wasn't only coming from the outside.

In its own way, it was actually kind of . . . nice.

He allowed himself one last look up at the sun.

Ignoring the utter wrongness of a vampire out and about in the daytime, his instincts, the brightness, and the fact that the whole situation was bringing his new "changes" to almost painful attention . . . this whole sun thing wasn't that bad.

* * *

Once again, Giles and Xander were standing uncomfortably on the front steps to Xander's house. The grass was still half dead and overgrown, the paint was still old and chipped, and one of the trash cans had been knocked over so that its contents now spilled all over the lawn and driveway.

Xander hated it when that happened. It was always so disgusting and time-consuming to pick up.

"I'm sorry to ask, but will we be going in anytime soon?"

Xander winced and turned back from his examination of the lawn to face Giles.

"Yeah, sorry." He tried again to ignore how tall and broad Giles had gotten. It was annoying, but things like that were becoming harder and harder to ignore as his time as a girl drew on. There were just so _many_ of those little things that marked his change, and there was only so much denial Xander could spend in one direction. Other things needed to be denied too, after all.

"But just as a quick warning, my dad's probably gonna be home today, and, well, like I said, he's not so good with the whole supernatural thing. Or with the temper-control. So, you should, you know, probably not say anything about that to him. Wouldn't be a good idea. Not pretty at all." Xander shook his head and tried to convey his absolute seriousness with his eyes. "Anti-pretty even. Why it would be so unpretty that—

"Yes," Giles interrupted, holding up a hand. "So I was told. Now will you please stop this incessant stalling and open the door."

"Fine then, don't listen to me," Xander muttered and turned to do just that.

No drunk or passed out parents in sight.

"Hmm, they must not be home yet. Oh well, another day." Xander shrugged and tried to close the door. "Let's get back to your place G-man. Spike's probably getting lonely without us."

"Yes, and we wouldn't want _that_, now, would we?" Giles' voice was extra dry.

"I _knew_ you'd understand!"

"Xander," Giles turned to look at him seriously and Xander looked away to avoid his eyes. "I understand that informing your parents of your nightly exploits and recent change may be rather difficult. I even understand your particularly strong protests against the informing of your father; _no_ son would like to inform their father that they are now, a, well . . . a daughter. But believe me when I say, this _must_ be done. They must be made to understand."

"I . . . I know but . . ."

"The truth is that we don't know how long this situation will last. And, Xander . . ." Giles continued, looking at him with sympathetic eyes even as he laid out the cold, hard truth. "You can _not_ go through this episode sleeping on my sofa and skipping school. People will soon start to think of you as yet another "runaway" and you cannot go through extended periods of schooling on make-up work. And," Here Giles paused, face almost sad, "And your parents deserve to know the truth. Or would you rather they think you dead?"

Xander swallowed and Giles still went on.

Dead?

"And you _will_ need your family's support in this. You've done well so far, but who's to say how you'll be in another week. We're still not even sure if this one change is even—

"All right, all right! I get it!" Xander threw his hands up to stop his talking. "No need to pound me into the ground, okay? I get it. We'll tell them. I just . . ." He sighed and looked down, reaching up to rub the back of his neck. "Forget it."

"Everything will be okay." Giles said, putting a reassuring hand on his shoulder. And he really looked as though he believed that.

"Are you sure?"

"I—"

"Hey! Who the hell are you, and what're ya doin' in my house!"

Surprised, Xander looked over to find that, yes, the door was still open.

"Oh, oh, par-pardon me sir. My name is—

"I don't care what your fuckin' name is! What're ya doin' in my house?"

And, yes, that was his dad. Who had apparently just come home from work while he and Giles had been busy talking and was now storming their way.

Dad was a low-level marketing grunt working for that big, screw-the-little-man type electronics company on the edge of town. So, he basically spent the day being ordered about and treated like shit, this treatment only made all the worse by the fact that his immediate boss was a woman.

Apparently this was emasculating.

So, coming home from this torture and affront to his male pride, Dad felt it only proper to order his son and wife about and basically treat _them_ like shit.

He wasn't mortally abusive or anything; he just needed to, you know, reaffirm his masculinity. Regain his place as the "Big Man."

Xander had never understood why people seemed to think he was being viciously abused. And he _really_ didn't understand why some people thought that abuse was sexual. It was majorly wiggy to think that some of his teachers and other adults looked at him and saw a victim of incestuous pedophilic rape and/or molestation in denial.

Anyone who'd ever even met his dad would know that he'd never rape Xander. That would be gay and thus feminine behavior. And, Lord knows, Dad would never stoop to doing anything he considered feminine.

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry, but you see—

"Ya know what? I don't fuckin' care. Get the hell off my lawn."

Dad had obviously stopped by a 7-11 or something on the way home for a pre-beer beer.

"I'm from your son's school."

"And what? That gives you the right to break into my house?"

"The door was already open, sir," Giles lied, "We assumed this meant someone was home and were merely waiting for someone to answer the bell when you arrived."

"Oh," Dad calmed a bit then snorted as he pushed past them, loosening his tie. "Damn woman probably forgot and is sleepin' again. Lazy bitch."

He left the door open, so Xander and Giles, taking this as an invitation, followed him in, closing the door behind them. There was the sound of moving clutter, banging glasses, and then a short silence before Xander's dad returned from the kitchen, holding a beer and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Dropping into his old chair, he turned to give Xander and Giles a narrow look.

"So who're you again?"

"My name is Rupert Giles." Giles walked further into the room and sat down on the couch, leaving Xander standing awkwardly off to the side. "The school librarian."

Here his Dad snorted again, taking a swing of his drink. "Yeah, that'd be a problem right there. No way that boy'd go inta one a those."

"Well I can assure you Mr. Harris that your son has spent quite a bit of time doing just that."

"What? Ya mean the brat's breakin' inta _libraries_ now?"

"N-no, of course not. I-I simply meant that he spends a good deal of time in my library."

Mr. Harris looked suspicious. "That's not one a those strange homo ways of talkin' bout sex, is it? Cuz' you can have the boy if you want—always knew he was little bitch—just don't come talkin' ta _me_ about it, okay? I don't want anythin' ta do with your lot's sick little homo fantasies."

Off to the side, Xander buried his head in his hands and shook his head.

"My-my lot?"

"Yeah, you know, you British-types."

"I . . . I . . . um . . . well . . ." Giles obviously didn't know what to say to that. "That's . . . that's not quite, ah, where I was, where I was going with that."

"No?"

"No. In fact . . ." Giles cleared his throat, trying to get back on track, "well . . . you-you have noticed that this town has a . . . a rather high, er, death-rate, correct?"

"Aw shit," his dad groaned, "The brat's not gone and gotten himself addicted to that PCP crap, has he?"

"Er . . . no."

And it just kept getting worse from there.

* * *

"Why _that_ . . . that-that _man_." Giles sputtered, hands clenching the steering wheel as he glared at the road in front of him. In the passenger seat, Xander looked over at him warily. Giles never got truly angry very often, and Xander was kind of worried about him doing so while driving.

"I . . . I can't even _believe_ . . ." Giles growled and made an angry right hand turn.

Tearing his eyes away from Giles, Xander turned to stare out the window, absently watching as buildings, trees, and the various signage of Sunnydale passed by.

Xander had known that telling his parents wouldn't help. Dad was the decision-maker, after all.

If his dad could have actually been convinced in the existence of magic, he would have only exploded over Xander changing into a _girl_, of all things. It would be seen as the ultimate act of sissy-ness and an almost unforgivable disappointment.

But then if his dad _couldn't_ be convinced, he would just explode over what would be seen as an incredibly stupid attempt to hoist more kids on him.

Today, Dad had chosen option number 2.

It would've been nice for his mom to have believed them, though. He hadn't expected to be able to stay at home, but he also hadn't wanted his mom to think he was _dead_.

Gradually, the surroundings began to register in Xander's mind, pulling him out of his absent haze. Now actually paying attention to the scenery passing outside his window, Xander realized that they were nowhere near Giles' neighborhood and were actually driving further away from it.

Hesitantly, Xander tried to get Giles' attention.

"Um . . ."

"And to think I was a—

"Um, Giles . . ."

"He didn't even—

"Where're we going?"

"Why I'd— Giles finally looked up from his angry mutterings. "Sorry?"

"Where're we going?"

"Oh, yes, well," Giles said, visibly trying to calm himself, "As it seems we won't be expecting any help from your parents," Giles gave the last word an ugly twist, and Xander winced, "I suppose you will just have to live with me until a cure can be found."

"But . . . but there's still Mom."

"Who we were unable to convince."

"We could try again. Without Dad."

Giles looked skeptical. "And she could make that-that absolute _brute_ think _rationally_?"

Xander paused.

Then: "Well, okay, a place to stay is definitely of the good," he allowed, deciding not to answer Giles' question. "But that still doesn't explain where we're going."

"We're going to Wallmart."

"Wallmart?" The G-man goes to _Wallmart_?

He nodded. "Yes, Wallmart"

"And we're going to Wallmart because . . . ?"

"Because I meant it when I said you couldn't get through this experience sleeping on my couch and I couldn't think of any other place open this late where I could buy a cot."

* * *

TBC


	6. Body Image

Don't own Buffy or any of the many brand name things/places that I might mention in this chapter, or in any of the previous chapters.

I'm trying to get more Spike POV in here but it's just not working. He's not doing anything.

* * *

Chapter # 6—Body Image

"Xander?" There was a knock on the dressing room door. "Are you alright in there?"

"Y-ye-yeah, Wills. I'm . . ." Xander swallowed, unable to tear his eyes away from the horrible vision in front of him, "I'm good."

"You sure? You've been in there for a really long time now."

"Y-yeah. I'm great." Despite the fact that Willow was behind the door and couldn't see him, Xander attempted to dredge up a smile. "I'll be out in minute, okay?"

"Well, okay . . . But hurry up. The others should be back soon."

It was the weekend and Buffy, Willow, and Giles had figured they should probably finally drag Spike and Xander down to the mall for some general clothes shopping. All of Spike's stuff had apparently been stolen and, in the end, they had all agreed that the world needed a clothed Spike more than Giles needed some extra cash.

The others had also apparently decided that Xander needed clothes that fit, even if only somewhat more reasonably, and that since Xander didn't want any, he would just have to be forced.

Xander still didn't get why he needed the girl clothes. He wouldn't be a girl for that long; what would he do with it all when he got big again? It was just a waste of money.

Plus, he'd tried out the bra thing and the Buffy chosen clothing and hadn't liked either of them.

And were panties _really_ that necessary? _Really?_

It was decided that the group would split up in order to prevent both major damage to Giles' credit card and the transformation of Xander into a life-size doll. Giles, that brave man, would take Buffy and Spike (Buffy to keep Spike in line and Giles to keep Buffy in line) to quickly grab some stuff for Spike, leaving Xander and Willow free to shop alone for a short while. Buffy had pouted at the arrangement but Giles had thankfully held firm.

Willow was so much more lenient than Buffy would've been, what with actually allowing him to buy girl clothes he was relatively comfortable wearing.

Of course that didn't mean he could get away without some girly underwear and trying things on.

Which lead him up to this moment. Looking into a mirror.

It was horrible.

Granted, it was one of those cheap mirrors put in department store dressing rooms that always seemed specifically designed to make people look fatter and uglier than they really were, but still. A mirror

And it was horrible.

A pile of clothing, still yet to be tried on, lay across the one seat in the room, his own clothing lying in a puddle at his feet. He had only been able to force himself into one pair of new, more girl-like, jeans before his eyes had accidentally caught his reflection.

It was really inevitable in this kind of situation. Dressing rooms as a group were generally notorious for their closet-like sizes and floor length mirrors.

Xander had been dreading going into one, both for the mirror and for the changing of clothes, but he had also been holding fast to his delusions of being able to get through this shopping experience without being forced to look at himself. He'd already gone a successful week without once catching sight of a reflection and he didn't want that winning streak to end just yet.

But now . . .

Although Buffy had initially protested its return, he was thankfully still wearing his much too large shirt, which billowed out and covered him very well from shoulder to mid thigh, so he couldn't see any of the more . . . extreme differences. As it was, just his own face was threatening to send Xander into a panic attack.

It was horrible.

He tried to focus on the similarities; wavy dark brown hair cut too short, thin lips, long face, large dark eyes. But his mind kept tripping over all the differences; thinner eyebrows, softer jaw-line, slimmer neck, slightly smaller nose, no stubble.

He could see himself in that face, but it wasn't his face.

And suddenly he needed to see the rest of him. Needed to see what else was gone.

Quickly throwing off the too large shirt and clumsily hopping out of the smaller jeans, he stood before the mirror in nothing but the panties and bra he had been unable to lose before coming here.

And he saw nothing.

Well, okay, he saw something. He still had a body, after all. It just wasn't _his_ body.

Desperately, he claimed long hairy legs—ignoring that they were a little less hairy than usual and weirdly shaped—and the slight pudge around his center from too much junk food. But that was it.

That was all that remained of his body.

The rest—good-sized hips, good-sized breasts, smaller shoulders, feminine curves, and an all-around lack of bulk and height—that was someone else. Someone not him.

This was almost as bad as his hyena possession.

Or maybe it was worse. He'd have to think about that one.

Because at least with his hyena possession he'd still had his body. Sure, someone else was driving it, but it was still _there_.

As soon as Xander's mind cleared enough to form any definite or understandable opinion, Xander hated it.

Hated the body.

Hated the almost lost state of identity that came with it.

His body had been a large part of what made him Xander. People saw the body and recognized it as Xander. Nobody would recognize him as Xander like this.

And, sure, maybe somebody wouldn't recognize him as Xander if he dyed his hair green and came to school dressed head to toe in black, but that was _different_.

"Xander?" There was another knock and Xander turned to give the door a cautious look. "It's been almost 15 minutes. Are you sure you're okay in there?"

"I'm _fine_. Really. Just having a little trouble with all these buttons and snap things."

There was pause, then a slightly unsure, "Well, okay . . ."

Xander waited until he could hear Willow walking a bit away before turning back to the mirror. In the background, Xander heard Buffy's almost accusing voice asking, "Just what kind of pants did you _give_ him?"

He had breasts. Real breasts.

Two mounds of firm, jiggly flesh now hung from his chest.

The soft and round girl-bits he had spent almost every other moment since puberty fantasizing about were now firmly attached to his body and weren't going anywhere fast. He could now look and feel to his heart's content.

He paused. When he thought about it like that, it was actually kind of . . . _eww_.

Shaking this off, Xander got back to the point. Or mindless staring, panic attack, nervous breakdown, whatever. What he was doing wasn't really the point.

The _point_ was that he had _girl_-breasts where there should be _guy_-breasts, there was a very noticeable lack of penis in the panties, and, oh yeah, he was actually _wearing_ panties.

Did this count as cross-dressing?

Oh god, did he even want this to _not_ count as cross-dressing? That would make him a girl, wouldn't it?

But he didn't want to be a cross-dresser _either_. He was a guy! A very macho manly man with manly stubble and manly muscles and a manly penis and no breasts and . . . and . . . and _fuck . . ._

He had to be guy.

He _had_ to.

* * *

Buffy, Giles, and Willow had eventually been forced to physically drag him from the dressing room, becoming incredibly concerned with his sudden bizarre shift in behavior as they watched him stumble about in a daze, eyes wide in confused shock.

Now that Xander had actually seen his reflection it seemed like he was almost hyper-aware of the body he now occupied.

And yes, it was the 'body he now occupied', because this was _not_ his body. It was a . . . a . . . well it was a something not his, and that's all that really mattered.

And it just really wasn't fair that he now had to go through all this _knowing_ and _feeling_ with something that wasn't even _his_.

He could feel every shift of cloth along his new curves, was now intensely aware of how his hips swayed when he walked, saw clearly everything and everyone's new height and width, and just could _not_ stop thinking about how weird it felt for his jeans to cling like they did to his legs and ass and between-legs area.

And, really, that last one was just going a little _too_ far, he thought. It was just _shoving_ his lackage of something near and dear into his face with every, single, step. Practically grounding the fact up his nose and into his brain for maximum torture.

Going into nice-overdrive, the others had rushed him back to Giles' house where they proceeded to walk around him as if he were glass, speaking to him in soft calming tones, fetching him cookies and blankets every few minutes.

And that was great, it really was. Cookies were always appreciated and it was pretty nice to be the center of all this attention. But Xander had weirdly found himself being comforted the most by Spike's response, a knowing laugh accompanied by a mocking, "Finally looked at yerself, eh? 'Bout time."

All this caring and supportive attention from his friends had the unfortunate side-effect of reminding him just why the attention was felt needed in the first place. If they had just overlooked his weird attitude he would've been able to work himself back into his denial-groove eventually and get on with his so-called normal life. But, no, they'd caught on and insisted on being nice, so his new and improved acknowledgment of his unwilling girlhood was essentially being forcibly held still under his nose, where he couldn't help but smell its stink.

Spike, on the other hand, had not stopped laughing. Had sat his unwillingly alive ass down in his armchair and not moved or taken a breather from the mockage-flow since he'd gotten out of the car.

Instead of this being just pure annoying though, it was actually somewhat calming, being something normal in the face of all this weirdness and taking Xander's attention away from his own hyper-sensitive body-sense. If Spike had been nice, Xander didn't know what he would've done, though he strongly suspected it would've involved breaking down and crying like a little bitch.

And once noticing the annoyed-calming effect of the bleached-one's presence, Xander could even see how Spike had been inadvertently helpful since the beginning, giving Xander both something to focus on other then his own changes and a person in a similar situation who wouldn't give in to hysteria for Xander to copy.

Trying to make things worse, Spike had ended up making things better.

Weird

In the end, he'd decided to find his own comfort using the well-tested TV-land-method, kicking his well-meaning but not-helping friends out of the room and hunkering down on the couch with his pile of cookies and the remote control.

Giles had been easy to get rid of, convinced to leave him alone in lieu of making more phone calls in search of a cure. The girls had been harder, but Xander had eventually been able to convince them he was fine, or would be mostly okay until they saw him again tomorrow, and they'd reluctantly left.

Spike, unfortunately and rather predictably, wouldn't leave at all. By this point in time, Spike had basically been promoted to furniture-status, having become a permanent fixture of Giles' living room, so unless Xander decided to forgo TV altogether and change rooms he was pretty much stuck with the asshole.

Good thing Spike was the one he wanted to avoid the least.

"Hey, demon-chow, how 'bout shutting up for a second, huh? Trying to watch TV over here and your stupid is messing with my zone."

"Should try th' Lifetime channel, pet," Spike suggested.

Xander smirked, "Need to get in touch with your own inner girl, do we?"

"Nah," Spike drawled as he settled back in his chair, "I'm lookin' out fer you now, aren't I? After-school special waitin' t' happen, you are. Need all th' bloody help y' can get."

"And I thank you kindly for your concern," Xander rolled his eyes, turning back to the TV, "Now shut up."

And if Xander didn't watch himself carefully, he might actually start enjoying these little arguments.

Not the person, mind you. The arguments.

Once a vampire, always a vampire, he says. Should just stake them all.

* * *

"So, let me make sure I have this right," Angel put up a hand and said, slowly, "Xander's a girl."

Buffy nodded. "Yep."

Sunday night patrol, and the first time Buffy and Angel had been able to meet up for a few weeks due to a clash between Angel's busy schedule of doing whatever it was he did and her own duties to her friends. Always happy to spend time with him, Buffy was taking the chance to fill Angel in on what he'd missed, slowing circling through the many cemeteries on her route.

"And Spike, Drusilla's Spike, is human," Angel's voice still slowed.

"Uh-huh."

He looked over at her. "And this has been going on for an entire week?"

"Pretty wiggy, huh?" she asked, briefly leaning into his side and obviously amused by his stunned expression.

"Yeah . . ." a strange emotion coloring Angel's voice, "wiggy."

Not paying attention, Buffy continued, "It hasn't been that bad though, really. I mean, Xan had a little freak-out at the mall yesterday, but he's back to normal now, so no big."

"And Spike?" Angel asked.

Buffy shot him a strange look. "Spike?"

"Yeah, Spike," Angel being very careful to keep his tone completely neutral, "How's it going with him?"

"Um," she absently tucked a stray bit of hair behind her ear, "well, I haven't really been paying that much attention. He seems fine though, I guess. Hasn't had any major breakdowns or anything." She shrugged, looking back up at her boyfriend.

"No, I mean, how is he acting? Does he seem to be acting, I don't know, strange, to you at all?"

"No, he's more acting like a complete jerk. I mean, he _could_ be a little more thankful, you know? We're helping him out of the goodness of our own hearts, here. I honestly don't know how Xander can stand to spend so much time with him."

"So he hasn't done anything out of character for him then?"

"No . . ." pausing, "Well . . . there was that one thing."

"One thing?" Coming to a halt on the sidewalk, Angel turned to give her his full attention.

"It was just that one time he escaped."

"Escaped?"

"Yeah, he knocked Xander out and ran off," she nodded, "It was so weird. When I found him again, he was just, like, sitting there out in the open, totally dazed. Didn't even put up a fight when I dragged him back to Giles' place or when I tied him up again either. And his ropes were totally cut through too. Giles is missing a kitchen knife to prove it. And so, Spike, evil vampire, is alone with this big knife and a knocked out Xander, and he just _leaves_ her there?" she shook her head in incredulity, "So weird."

Angel looked down, considering. "Yeah . . ."

Continuing their walk, the pair fell into silence for a moment, each thinking their own thoughts.

Finally Buffy just had to ask it. "Why?"

Angel's head shot up. "Huh?"

"Why so concerned about Spike all of a sudden? I mean, you have to have a reason, right?"

"Oh, right. It's . . ." Angel took a moment to compose his thoughts, "well I guess I'm just wondering what Spike being human really means. In the end, how human _is_ human?"

"Well, how human can a guy really get?" she asked, puzzled by the question, and began counting the points off on her fingers, "He eats, he breathes, he's got a pulse, there's no nasty sun allergies and he can't go all bumpy. He's _human_."

"Well, yes, but . . ." that strange tone returning to the vampire's voice as he looked over at her, "Does that mean he has a soul, too?"

"I . . ." Buffy trailed off, momentarily speechless as the understanding hit her, "Well . . . he'd have to, wouldn't he . . . ? I mean . . . humans have souls. It's this whole thing we have. He'd have to."

* * *

The night after that horrible trip to the mall and Xander was ready to brave the shower again.

This time though, this time he would be giving himself a _good_ washing. None of that brush by the skin with a cloth and squeeze his eyes tight stuff. No this time he was getting serious. Really scrubbing out all that dirt and getting up close and personal with this new body-suit he was wearing.

He could do this.

Taking a deep breath, and then another, Xander stood in front of the bathroom mirror and slowly opened his eyes.

Stared into a stranger's face.

He didn't think he would ever get used to that. To looking into a mirror and _knowing_ the reflection he saw was himself even when it wasn't.

Maybe he should've just kept to the first hand touching-feeling thing.

Looking now at his arms or legs was nothing, mildly wiggy at most. _This_ was just flat out wrong.

Willow and Buffy didn't understand. It's just a little change, they said; think of it as a chance to learn the inner workings of the female mind.

And Xander had laughed along with them, made a few jokes of his own, keeping the situation light. All easy to do when completely ignorant of the true amount of damage being done here.

This was a little bit _more_ than a bad make-over.

He had breasts. Real breasts. As a basic rule, Xander just didn't have breasts. Had _never_ had them, and had never even once seriously thought of getting surgery done to _gain_ them.

Which of course brought up the winning question: Was he even still Xander?

Dragging his eyes away from that strange girl in the mirror, Xander forced his mind back to his task.

Right. He was taking a shower.

Then he'd go to bed. Bed sounded nice.

* * *

TBC 


	7. Answers Not Wanted

And, finally, an important chapter.

* * *

Chapter #7: Answers Not Wanted

Xander decided to skip school the next day. It wasn't like he did anything there anyways, and he just wasn't feeling up to being around people at the moment.

And it turned out to be a pretty good day too, watching TV both with Spike and alone, making a run to the nearest place selling food and buying some junk, wearing his biggest pair of new jeans and original huge t-shirt.

That shirt hadn't been anything special to him before, but it was really starting to grow on him now. It was all nice and billowy; they really needed to have more billowy shirts in this world.

His Slayerette nature and sense of duty eventually dragged him back to the library though; somewhat curious to see if there was anything new out there needing a good butt-kicking. The rest of the Hellmouth couldn't take a break just because he was a girl, after all.

"Xander, you've been spending a lot of time around Spike, right?"

"Um. . . ." having just entered the room, Xander paused on his way toward the table Buffy and Willow had chosen for the day, "Yeah? More than you guys, at least."

Inattentively tapping her pencil against her history book, Buffy bit her lip, a look of serious deliberation on her face. "Has he seemed weird to you?"

"Weird?" Xander asked, raising a brow, "As in weirder than his usual weird?"

She nodded.

Taking a seat across from Buffy at the small table, Xander looked to Willow for a clue as to what this was all about only to find that same curious attention being directed his way.

"Um . . . no?" looking between the two girls somewhat uncertainly, "I mean, hey, don't really know what he was like when he was still part of the fang-gang, besides that whole '_You human, I kill,_' thing he had going on at least. He hasn't been, like, wigging out on me or anything, though."

"So he hasn't, like, started apologizing or anything? Maybe been strangely nice for no apparent reason?"

"What" Xander laughed, "Apologizing? Being _nice_? Are we even talking about the same person here?"

"No, really," Buffy insisted, "I'm being serious. Has he done anything that seemed distinctly not-evil lately?"

"I don't know," he finally said, "Why are you even asking me this?"

Here, Willow leaned forward, saying as though it were confidential, "Buffy thinks Spike has a soul."

"A _soul_?" Xander shot Willow a surprised look clearly asking '_really?'_ before turning to Buffy for confirmation.

"Well why not?" Buffy defended herself, "I mean, he's human, right? He's got to have one."

"And if he doesn't," Willow added, raising a finger for emphasis, "then he's not actually human. He's something else. That could mean something."

"Have you guys asked Giles?" Xander asked.

Both girls shook their heads.

"There hasn't really been a chance," Willow explained, "He wasn't here during lunch, and he's been talking on the phone in his office since school ended."

"Ooooh," Xander grinned, easily throwing aside the more serious soul-having issues to waggle his eyebrows, "a lady-friend?"

Buffy smiled. "Don't think so, I'm pretty sure I heard the name Robert in there a few times."

"Either way, Ms Calender is bound to be heart-broken," voice filled with a deep sympathy, he turned to Willow, completely serious, "You'll have to break it to her gently, of course."

"Of course," Willow said, holding the same serious expression of deep sympathy. Unable to hold it and cracking with a giggle a few seconds later.

Shaking her head at the display, Buffy absently glanced in the direction of Giles' office to find Giles watching them with fond tolerance, casually leaning against his librarian desk. "Oh! Hi, Giles," smiling, "didn't see you there."

"So I noticed," his voice that special brand of British-dry.

Xander grinned, totally unrepentant. Willow, looking slightly guilty, gave him a small, embarrassed, wave. "Hi . . ."

A weathered notebook in hand, he smiled slightly in her direction and approached the table. "So I hear you had a question for me?"

"Yeah," Buffy looked up at him, "We were wondering if there was a way to tell if Spike had a soul."

"Actually, it was more like _they_ were wondering," Xander said, resting his head in his palm and pointing a finger in the girls' direction, "I don't really care."

"Well, you _should_ care," Buffy frowned at him, "This is important."

"Why?" Xander asked, hoping this wasn't going to turn into yet another Angel and his super special soul discussion.

"Because if Spike has a soul then we can't cure him."

"But it's okay to cure him _without_ a soul?"

"Of course"

He stared at her for a moment, trying to work that through his mind. "I don't get it."

"_Xander_," Buffy rolled her eyes with an irritated huff, obviously thinking him being purposely slow, which he kind of was, "if Spike has a soul then that means he's an actual _person_ now. Curing him would be, like, _killing_ him."

"You know, now that we're on the subject," Xander started as he sat straighter, looking to Giles now, "I never really got just why we decided to cure him in the first place. I'm kinda likin' not having bad ass powerful vamps tryin' to kill us all."

"So we don't cure him?" Willow asked with a small frown, "That seems kinda unfair."

"Yeah, since we obviously care so much about being fair to vamps." smiling to lessen the harshness.

"But that's the whole _point_," Buffy gestured sharply at him with her pencil, "He's not a vampire now."

"He's always gonna be a vampire, Buff. It's really not the body that's important here," Xander shook his head, "I mean, just because I've got the equipment doesn't mean I'm a real girl."

"But that's different," Buffy argued, "If you'd been vamped instead of just having a gender-change, you'd be a completely different person because you'd lost your soul."

"I guess," he said, "But that's still no reason to believe that the reverse happens when a vamp is de-vamped. They'd still have a demon's mind. No amount of soul can change that."

"Angel doesn't—

"_Yes_, and while all of those are very good points," Giles said, quickly breaking into the developing argument, "I'm afraid that this discussion will just have to wait. I've. . . ." pause to uncomfortably fiddle with his glasses, "I've found it."

Reluctantly settling back from their discussion, Xander and Buffy shared a three-way look with Willow, each hoping one of the others would have a clue on what he was talking about.

"Um . . . yay?" Willow cheered.

Giles nodded with a distracted, "Yes," as he busied himself with the weathered notebook in his hand, quickly flipping through until he found the right page and placing it down for all to see. "Here," indicating a direct spot at the top of the page.

There on the sheet was a roughly drawn sketch of a stone, Egyptian eye crossed by a single slash clearly drawn on top, scrawled words below reading _'The Eye of T'rambilk'_. Xander swallowed roughly.

"The person I have been speaking to for the last few hours was a good friend of mine who I had asked to keep an eye out for anything bearing this name," taking his hand out of the way, "Very luckily, he himself had an acquaintance very interested in the especially obscure who happened to hold a copy of a rare manuscript containing the accounts of a few of the most peculiar mystical experiments. One of which was written by a Dr. Nicholas Russell on the psychological effects of various cursed objects," getting sidetracked, "Most fascinating stuff really."

"Yeah, yeah, but what's that all mean?" Buffy asked, "What's it actually _do_?"

Willow's head tilted in concern. "What do you mean by psychological?"

All of which were very good questions, but nothing that couldn't be answered later, Xander thought, asking the most important question of them all, "So, you know how to cure it?"

"It . . . well . . ." Giles glanced at them, then at the notebook, then grabbed for his glasses and began cleaning, "Well, according to the experiments, it has come to be generally accepted that the curse causes any that look into the Eye to change into the form the individual fears most to be."

"Fears most to be?" Buffy echoed, turning to give Xander a weird look. "So Xander's biggest fear is girls?"

"What? No!" Xander exclaimed, turning to her in shock, "I _love_ girls. The Xan-man is a definite fan of the boobies." He thought he'd made that pretty obvious.

Willow giggled, "That sounds so weird coming from you like this."

"Oh _yeah_," Xander leered, waggling his eyebrows, "lesbianism." Buffy rolled her eyes.

"Yes, well, that's not quite what I meant," Giles giving them a look, "The form the person fears most to be is more indicative of a form made up of qualities the individual fears to have."

And that made absolutely no sense to Xander.

Willow seemed to understand though. "You mean that if a – a millionaire or someone who really likes money looked into the Eye, he would become a really poor person?"

"Not quite," Giles said, "_The Eye of T'rambilk_ does not seem to have the field of influence or – or power necessary to transform a person from rich to poor immediately. If I understood my friend correctly, the Eye can only affect the – the body of the individual, not the surroundings. Not to mention the fears played upon would never be quite as concrete as physical money," absently tapping his glasses against his chin as he studied his hasty scrawl upon the notebook, "Using that same metaphor, the millionaire would more likely not lose all of his money but lose his ability to make or keep that money, though the way in which that fear would be embodied is different for each individual," looking back up at his audience, "It seems as though the resultant form isn't a simple constant 'if this happens then this is the result.' It's very tied into the personal experiences of the one cursed, building upon an individual's memories and perspective."

All those words and still not a single clue

Xander looked at Buffy. "Did you understand any of that?" She shook her head, so Xander turned a questioning look at Willow.

"Basically, he means that if Cordelia had looked at this thing, she would've become ugly because she likes popularity so much and is so focused on what people look like."

Oh.

"Well, maybe not quite as simple as that, but, yes. That is the general idea."

Buffy nodded her understanding. "Well, nothing like that happened to Xander, and Spike's no uglier than he usually is, so that eye-thing must not be what we're looking for. Spike was probably lying."

"No, no, I'm afraid he wasn't. He really has no reason to lie about this, especially when he too needs the cure, and the effects, the trigger, Spike's description . . . it all fits," turning to Buffy, "And, remember, ugliness is not the only possible result. Any number of- of possibilities could occur."

"And so that's why those demons Spike got it from said it would make Buffy weak?" Willow asked, looking up from her careful study of the notebook, "They were assuming that a Slayer would fear being weak?"

"Correct." Giles smiled approvingly.

"But . . ." Buffy started, her brow scrunching in thought, "where does the psychological come into that? I mean, a Slayer and weakness? That's pretty direct and physical. Slayer can't fight, Slayer dies, the end."

"Yes, well," Giles cleared his voice, put on his glasses, going back to uncomfortable as he got into the bad news, "you – you have to remember that Xander's new form is not random; it was chosen based on very specific fears. In essence, the curse isn't the actual change; it's the _effects_ of that change on the individual. The effects can be physical, I suppose, being used in fights as a way to weaken an opponent as Spike intended, but the fear's of most individuals are – are not usually as . . . as sudden as those of a Slayer. They're simple fears of letting friends down or hurting loved ones, all fears that can take some time to be felt in their entirety. The – the Eye, well, it was a - apparently once used as a . . . as a form of, er, long-term psy - psychological torture, in a sense."

"Torture?" silent up till then as he took this all in, Xander shoot up in his seat, eyes wide and voice reaching a note that would have normally been impossible. "I don't want to be tortured!"

"Well – well, maybe psychological _turmoil_ would be a more accurate term," Giles hurried to correct himself.

"But either way it's hurting Xander?" Willow asked, wide eyes flying between Giles and Xander, "How"

"Yeah," Buffy demanded, "I want to know that too."

And the glasses were off again. "Like –like I said, it – it's not the actual form; it's the -the effect of that form. Xander did not become a girl randomly. This form was brought forth by his - his own specific fears. Fears he will now be forced to face on a constant basis."

"Constant basis?" Xander repeated faintly, falling back in his seat as split second memories of the last two days played in his mind.

His unnerving sense of dissociation between himself and his reflection, his utter hatred of what he saw there, his hyper-awareness of his own body . . .

All bad things, but were they really something he'd go _insane_ over?

And he'd never exactly feared having a strange girl's body to call his own; the thought had honestly never even crossed his mind. There was of course that small fear of possession brought on by his hyena experience, but what kind of fears did he have that would make him a girl?

Maybe, since he was usually pretty tall, he feared shortness along with possession? Those high shelves were turning out to be killers.

And Spike was human. What kind of weird vampire-fear did that? One of Xander's favorite foods was hamburgers, but he'd never really feared being a cow. Or having the life of a cow. Standing around all day eating grass or sleeping, no school, no parents; that actually sounded like a great life.

"And just how _much_ is this going to hurt him?" Buffy demanded.

"Well, I – I suppose it all depends on the individual really; on how much or how deeply one fears, on how well one copes. In Xander's case . . . well, Xander has already proven to be more than capable of coping and adapting to - to unusual circumstances. Most begin to, ah, deteriorate within the first day, the shock being too much. Er . . ." And Giles, finally able to face him, turned a concerned look his way. "How _are_ you feeling by the way?"

"Well I have to say, I'm not feeling all that tortured." Xander smiled uneasily, mind still caught up on the question of just what he was supposedly being tortured with.

The loss of his ability to cross his arms over his chest like normal? That could probably get pretty annoying.

Not something he really feared though.

"You sure?" Buffy asked.

He waved their concern off. "Yeah, I'm fine. Dandy even. I don't have much of a mind to deteriorate anyways."

"Xander," Willow scolded, "don't say that."

"Sorry Wills."

"Yes, well," Giles said, uncomfortably clearing his throat in face of emotional scenes, "If - if you _do_ begin to feel any ill effects, I would hope you will come tell one of us."

"Sure," Xander shrugged, "But how bad could it actually get? I mean, I'm not gonna be a girl for long, anyways. Your guy knows where to find a cure, doesn't he?"

"Oh, er, yes, the cure, um," Giles's suddenly became intensely focused on his notebook, grabbing it from where it lay atop Willow's schoolbooks and moving a few steps away from the table, "Right."

And that so didn't give Xander a good feeling.

Willow's worried look returned tenfold. "There is a cure, isn't there? I mean I know what I read, but there _is_ a cure, right? There has to be."

Xander looked over at her. "What'd you read?" He'd been so caught up in the picture he hadn't actually bothered to try deciphering the words.

Giles looked over at Xander, then quickly away. "Yes . . . I . . . I'm sure we can find some sort of cure. Somehow."

There was an uncomfortable pause, strangely filled by the sound of Spike's voice loudly echoing in Xander's head.

_PERMANENT_

He'd basically signed that idea off as Spike trying to scare him, and it probably was, but now . . .

"What do you mean _somehow_?" Xander demanded, "That guy's book doesn't say how to cure it?"

"Ah . . ." Giles started and Willow shifted in her seat, looking a little guilty for bringing it up. "I'm sure there's nothing to worry about."

"But it doesn't say the cure." Xander narrowed his eyes. "Does it at least say if it _can_ be cured? I mean just tell me that it can, and everything's good." No answer, both Giles and Willow actively avoiding his gaze. "Please just tell me it can be cured. Lie if you have to."

"Oh no, no, it can be cured. Really." Willow smiled reassuringly, Giles taking the chance to quickly escape into his office, hopefully to grab some important, cure-having, book and not to just run away.

"Are you lying?" Xander asked, eyeing her suspiciously.

"Of course not," she said and, seeing that she was telling the truth, he let out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.

Thank god.

Unfortunately, Buffy just had to break into this calm. "Then what's got you and Giles so worried?"

Quickly glancing at Xander then away, the uncomfortable and slightly guilty look on Willow's face did nothing for his nerves.

"Nothing" she very obviously lied.

Seeing this, Xander sighed, deciding to just get everything over with, "Come on Wills. I can take it. What'd the thing say?"

"You sure?"

"I'm sure. How bad can it be after learning that I'm being slowly, psychologically tortured?"

"Um . . ." She and Buffy shared a disturbed glance at his joking tone.

"Well okay . . ." clasping her hands atop the school books in front of her and lowering her eyes, she began, "It's nothing big really. Just that nobody really knows the cure because all the other people who've been cursed have never, um, well were never actually cured all the way. Not – not because there isn't a cure, since there is one, just because none of them had the – the resources, you know? Books and magic and – and, well, none of them really lived all that long either, or – or you know, they kinda went insane," a nervous glance his way, "But you, you have the books and the magic and all that helpful stuff. And you have me and Buffy and Giles, and so you're not gonna be doing any of that going insane or committing suicide. I won't let you," now narrowing her eyes at him, her face going serious and commanding, "You got that mister?"

No known cure?

Eyes wide, he nodded. "Death and insanity are no-no's. Got it."

"Yeah . . ." looking somewhat scared for him, Buffy visibly forced herself to shake it off and switch gears. "So . . ." clumsily trying to change the subject, "How'd you guys do on that pop-quiz in Bio today?"

Distracted, he nodded again. "Seeing as how I wasn't there, I'm gonna have to say I failed miserably."

No known cure? As in, no known cure at _all_?

"Oh," awkward pause, "Right, um," making one more attempt at turning the topic away from his situation, "Did you guys see that episode of _Charmed_ last night?"

But everything had a cure somewhere, right? That's what Giles said, at least.

Did that mean they'd have to go find or make one themselves?

If they couldn't tell how this thing would react to stuff, that . . . that could take awhile.


	8. Something Like Understanding

* * *

Chapter #8: Something Like Understanding

It didn't happen very often, but even Xander had times where he needed some time away from everyone to just sit and think. This just happened to be one of those times.

Back in the library, Buffy and Willow had tried their hardest to put the last few minutes, and Giles' revelation, behind them by making awkward conversation and turning back to their homework, ignoring Xander's strange silence as he stared at the table and struggled with his emotions, something which Xander was almost pathetically grateful about.

But when he found tears beginning to well up in his eyes, Xander had finally been forced to admit that he wasn't going to be winning the fight against his emotions any time soon and that he needed to get out of there before he broke down in public. So he had yelled to Giles that he was walking back to the house and rushed out of the library before Willow or Buffy could think to follow him.

And this led up to now, Xander sitting on the couch of Giles' living room, trying to control his sniffles as he escaped from reality into the TV screen.

He didn't get why he was being so pathetic about this whole thing, really. Sure, being a girl wasn't exactly what he would call of the good but still, a little thing like not being cured as quickly as expected shouldn't be sending him running for the tissues.

It had to be because of his new girl-ness. Girls were always crying and moody. It was the only logical explanation because Xander had never used to cry when he was a guy.

Especially not over something as little as this.

And why hadn't he cried when he'd first gotten the curse? Or when Giles had told him that the curse could last for months, and that his parents were going to think he was dead? Shouldn't those times have been a lot more cry-worthy?

And, plus, really. He was Xander. No, _duh_, there wasn't a cure. It had to be one of those major rules of the universe that nothing could ever go right for him. He should've been ready for something like this. For God's sake, he'd even been warned.

Fuck, he was such an _idiot_.

This last thought bringing on another wave of depression; Xander blinked back the tears desperately and swallowed hard. He was being such a wimp. He needed to stop that.

"Are y' actually _crying_?" Spike's voice asked suddenly, breaking through his concentration. Surprised, Xander jumped at the unexpected question and his head snapped to the side to find Spike just entering the front door. The move also revealing what were most likely blood-shot eyes, Spike grinned evilly and answered his own question, looking far too amused with the idea. "You _are_."

"No'm not," Xander denied, ducking his head in embarrassment and trying to hide any possible evidence. He thought about wiping his eyes with his sleeves but figured that would be too much of a give-away.

"No?" still amused, Spike walked closer and Xander clenched the material of his jeans as he prepared himself to be mocked. "Then wot's all this then?" Spike asked, "Did yer new dress get all dirty, luv?" as though he were talking to an especially cute 3yr old girl. You know, the one in pink frills having a tea-party with her dolls.

And Xander had the sudden horrific image of himself—in his real male-Xander body—wearing one of those exact same dresses. A soft pink with lace ruffles absolutely everywhere, it was stretched out of shape and coming up almost indecently high on his hairy man-legs, showing ruffled white girly panties whenever he moved. His cheeks covered with way too much blush, two ponytails, held by pink unicorn clips on the top of his head, stuck straight up in the air and his feet were encased in cute ruffled socks and shiny pink buckled shoes.

And _that_ was his future?

"I'm not wearing a dress," he managed to choke out past his horror. A little anger in there, which was good, but he still felt like he was about to start bawling any second now.

Sitting down next to him, Spike patted him on the knee consolingly. "That's alright, luv. We'll find y' one soon. Don't worry your pretty little head over it."

"I don't _want_ a dress, either, asshole," Xander growled, angrily shoving Spike's hands off of him with a glare, standing up, and clenching his hands into tiny fists.

"No?" Spike asked, putting on the most irritating face of confusion, "But I thought _all_ birds liked dresses."

"I'm a _guy_."

Leaning back in his seat, Spike looked Xander up and down meaningfully.

"I _am_," Xander insisted.

"Whatever y' say, luv," Spike smirked.

"God," Xander made a sound of frustrated disgust, turning away from Spike, and then almost crossed his arms in irritation before remembering why he wasn't doing that anymore and got even more annoyed. "You wouldn't be so amused if you knew what Giles found."

"Yeah?" Spike asked, stealing the remote and settling back in his seat to watch TV. "Wot's he say then?"

Xander turned and glared accusingly at the bastard. "He found out what your rock-thing did to us."

"Yeah?" Spike asked again, not really paying attention as he clicked through the channels, "Wot's that?"

"It turns us into our deepest fears, apparently."

The rapid channel flipping paused on a Febreeze commercial and Spike turned to Xander. "Yer joking," he said, voice flat and disbelieving.

"I'm told it's supposed to all be pretty painful, actually," Xander told him, "Very big on the crazy making."

"Right," Spike scoffed, turning back to the TV, "'Cos breathin' is obviously such excruciating torture."

Xander shot Spike an annoyed glance at that. "Buffy thinks you have a soul."

Spike noticeably tensed in his seat. "A soul?" he asked, deceptively casual.

"Yep" Xander smirked at his discomfort.

"An' yer tellin' me this because . . . ?"

"Well, a soul would be pretty painful, don't you think?" Xander asked innocently, loving that he was finally getting a response, "Emotionally at least."

Not able to dispute this, Spike clenched his jaw, eyes locked on the TV screen, "An' th' Slayer thinks I've got me a bleedin' soul 'cos o' this?"

"Well that, and 'cuz of the whole human-thing. Even human serial killers have souls." Xander shrugged then paused and tilted his head to consider this, "At least, we think they do."

"Right," Spike said, "An' th' cure?"

"None"

Spike's eyes flew open in unmasked surprise and he turned to look up at Xander. "Wot?"

"There isn't one," Xander said, some of his sadistic delight vanishing as he remembered, and he frowned. "Apparently most of the people that were cursed before never had the resources to find one and those that did could never find one that worked quickly enough."

"Quickly enough?"

"Uh, yeah . . ." Xander hesitated, giving Spike a quick look, "As in before they went insane or killed themselves."

Spike just stared at him, taking a moment to digest this pretty nasty bit of info and then looked at Xander with a strange expression. "An' yer _okay_ with this?" he asked incredulously.

"Okay with this?" Xander echoed, drawing back to return Spike's look of incredulity. "Of _course_ I'm not okay with this."

"Well, y' seem rather happy for a person not okay with this."

"That's just me being sadistic and enjoying your pain," Xander said defensively, "Of _course_ I'm upset. I've just been turned into a fucking girl, remember? A _girl. _I have _breasts_," gesturing angrily at the things in question, "Actual breasts! Xanders don't _have_ breasts."

And what did Spike do at this announcement? Did he drop to the floor and apologize for everything he'd said? No. The bastard merely smirked and lowered his eyes to Xander's chest, then followed this up by actually saying, "Good thing y' ve never had a cock then, eh? Bet y'd miss that something awful."

The bastard

Xander stared at the ex-vamp in shock, unable to believe that he now had some guy blatantly checking out him out. "Ar- Are - Are you really . . . ? I mean, you can't . . . you can't . . ." Xander didn't know quite what to say to something like this, finally snapping, "My face is up _here_, asshole," both indignant and completely horrified, Xander moved one arm to block the other's view, raising the other hand to point in the direction of his face.

Spike didn't bother looking up.

"Yeah," Spike said, tilting his head to better take in the much more attractive curves that had just appeared, "but this show's more interesting."

Xander figured that for his own mental health he should just ignore that, bringing his other arm down to join its partner in blocking Spike's view, and continued, "And I did have a cock, okay? Just felt a little weird to scream my deep grief over its loss in the middle of the street," Spike still staring blatantly at his chest area, Xander shifted on his feet uncomfortably, "Besides, that's really not the point. The point is that this whole thing is starting to sound pretty damn permanent."

His show gone, and with it any distraction from what he was hearing, Spike frowned, finally looking up at Xander's red face, "An' he's sure about this?"

"Yeah," Xander nodded tersely, "he's sure. Apparently the book was pretty clear on this one thing."

Spike was thankfully silent as he digested this new info, allowing Xander time to get his own emotions back in check.

Because for this to be permanent? Xander swallowed roughly as another picture popped into his head, this one of male-him in a lacy wedding dress complete with veil and mysterious groom in a black tuxedo at his side.

"God," Xander choked out, horrified. And _that_ was his future?

"No," Spike finally said, abruptly getting to his feet to pace, shaking his head in denial. "Can't be right."

"Yeah?" Xander asked, coming out of his horrified daze and turning somewhat hopeful eyes on him, "Why not?"

"Well, it's obvious, innit?" Spike said, "You, I can see," a quick look of disgust shot his way, "Makes perfect sense you'd be afraid o' a weak 'lil girl. But me?" he gestured to himself arrogantly, "Humans are hardly sumthin out of my nightmares. Yer nuthin but food."

Xander was unimpressed by this deduction, "And there you go."

Spike looked at him, obviously wondering what that meant. "Yeah?"

"Well, a powerful bad-ass vamp like yourself wouldn't want to be food, would he? I happen to know for a fact that _you_ don't," Xander said, his voice honey sweet. "Hiding out at your enemy's house to keep away from the big, bad, scary monsters."

Spike's eyes narrowed and Xander could see him clenching his fists as he grit out, "I am _not_ afraid."

"Funny," Xander replied, tilting his head to the side, "All signs seem to be pointing differently."

And, finding nothing immediate to say to this, Spike defensively turned the conversation back to mocking Xander. "An' turnin' inta a bloody bird is right brave o' you, yeah?"

"Alright, look," Xander walked over to Spike aggressively, jabbing a finger in his direction. "I've _never_ claimed to be Mr. Bravery, okay? I'm the breakable human guy in the group, remember?"

Moving closer, Spike sneered down at her, deliberately showing the difference in heights. "Not so much the guy anymore, eh, pet?

Xander tilted his head up and sneered right back at him. "Not so much the demon anymore, eh, soul-boy?"

Spike's smirk vanished. "I don't have a soul."

"And you're pretty insistent about that, aren't you?" Xander demanded, prodding his chest with a finger, "Do I detect a little _fear_ in there?"

"Course not," Spike muttered, brushing aside Xander's finger, and apparently deciding that now would be the perfect time for a good smoke. Stepping away from him—Yeah, you run. You run like the sissy boy you are, Xander thought victoriously—Spike scrimmaged around in his duster for a cigarette, finding one, lighting up, and blowing a lungful of smoke into Xander's face.

Coughing and waving the smoke out of his face, Xander glared at him. "You're not supposed to smoke in here."

Spike ignored him, "Wot if I don't fear not being cured?"

"Then you would have been turned into something you _did_ fear not being cured from," Xander answered, somehow easily following the rapid change of subject, "Were you not listening?"

"But wot if I jus' _stop_ fearing it?"

And here Xander paused. He hadn't thought of that.

Glancing at Spike then turning his attention away and down to the floor, he shrugged uncomfortably. "I dunno. Maybe."

"Right . . ." Spike trailed off, bringing his cigarette back to his lips.

There was a moment of almost companionable silence, each lost in thought. Then Xander turned an accusing look on Spike. "This is all your fault, you know."

"Yeah?" Spike gave him a sideways glance. "I forced y' t' look at th' thing, did I?"

"Well, no," Xander allowed resentfully, only getting angrier at Spike for being right, and went to plop himself back down on the sofa, "But if you'd never tried to use it on Buffy, then I wouldn't have even been _able_ to look at it," glaring at the bastard, sure in his point.

"An' if I'd never used it on th' Slayer then I'd never 'ave been able to, either," Spike replied, obviously thinking Xander an idiot.

"Well . . ." shifting irritably in his seat, "yeah," Xander finally muttered, noticeably uncomfortable with admitting this, "But since it was your stupid idea in the first place, you actually deserved it."

Spike raised a brow at him. "An' you don't?"

"I don't," he said, raising his chin stubbornly.

"Then tell me, pet, jus' how _did_ y' get cursed?" Spike asked, "I don' think I ever quite got that bit."

Xander winced at the reminder, but remained stubborn. "It was when I tried to pick you up and take you back to Giles'," he lied.

"Of course," Spike drawled, smirking knowingly as he let himself drop back into his own chair.

"It's true," Xander insisted.

"An' I believe you," Spike said, putting on his most sincere expression. Obviously he didn't really, so Xander sat back on the couch, feeling a pout coming on.

"I'm gonna tell Giles you smoked in here," he said, voice coming dangerously close to a whine.

Spike snorted. "Oh, nice," he said, settling back in his chair with obvious amusement, "Very mature. Y' gonna stick out yer tongue at me next?"

Xander tried to look at him threateningly, "I just might," but had to admit that the response _had_ been pretty weak and couldn't quite contain a small smile.

* * *

TBC


	9. The Living Dead

* * *

Chapter #9: The Living Dead

Waking up the next morning, going to the bathroom, taking a shower, and getting dressed, Xander found himself having a little more trouble than usual with ignoring everything.

It was just all so _there_, you know? It was just all so present and noticeable.

It seemed that as time went on, and as this thing started to look more and more permanent, Xander's ability to deny things was wearing itself out. He could only deny things for so long before they came back to hit him in the face, after all, and he had a bad feeling that the point of face-hittage was coming up pretty soon.

He couldn't go on like this. There was nothing else he could do but accept it that, yes, he was a girl, and that, yes, he would be a girl for some time.

Every other not so good thing in his life that he had ever used the ignorance-technique on—his parents, school bullies, Willow's crush on him, bad grades—that stuff had worked because they were just individual things that made up a small part of his world. They were easily ignored.

His new girlhood was a bit bigger, encompassing almost everything he could think of. Sex, school, family, friends, his clothing, going to the bathroom, reaching things in hard to reach places, even just walking around the house he had to be careful not to let his new hips bump into stuff and knock everything over.

So he knew that, logically, ignoring his girlness would never work. There would always be something to remind him and if he kept ignoring it then all he could expect was overemotional reaction after overemotional reaction every time he saw his face and was surprised.

He didn't want to be a girl, and he didn't want to accept it, but it looked like he might not have a choice.

Something which only became clearer that next morning.

Taking a sip of his coffee, Giles turned the page of his morning paper and frowned at something he saw towards the bottom of the page. "Xander . . ." he said, breaking the comfortable silence between them.

"Yeah?" Xander asked, looking up from his cereal.

"I . . . I think you may want to see this." Giles folded the paper neatly and placed it on the table in front of him, the Obituaries page face up.

Sticking another spoonful of cereal into his mouth, Xander chewed as his eyes scanned the page. Swallowing, he started to ask, "What am I supposed to be— then stopped, eyes catching on what Giles must have been talking about. There towards the bottom of the page was his name, Alexander LaVelle Harris.

And next to it: Died November 27, 1997

Xander dropped his spoon into his bowl and grabbed the paper, bringing it closer for a second look. "Alexander Harris went missing last week and has been presumed dead," he read, "Funeral is scheduled for . . ." he trailed off, looking at the paper in shock, "I'm . . . I'm dead?"

Giles looked at him sympathetically. "It appears so."

"But . . . but I can't be dead . . . I'm alive. I . . ." turning to Giles, half-hoping that this was just a mistake, "Don't they normally wait two weeks before declaring death?" he asked, "It's only been a week."

"I thought so too, but . . ." Giles shrugged, killing Xander's hopes.

This was real.

Xander turned back to the paper, staring helplessly at the small section bearing his name. Just one out of almost fifteen deaths and only three sentences long . . . That was all he had amounted to in life apparently, and it was kind of pathetic.

"I'm dead . . ." He said again, trying out the sound of the words on his ears. It still sounded wrong.

He couldn't be dead. He was alive.

What was his mom going to do now? Who was going to help her out when dad got too drunk?

Oh God. What was _he_ going to do?

He couldn't ever go back home or to school if he was _dead_.

"I'm sorry," Giles said, gently taking the paper from Xander's loose grip. "I'm sure that – that after all of this is through, you can go home and fix any . . . misconceptions."

"Yeah . . ." Xander said, trying to picture that scene. It wasn't a good thought.

They'd never believe him. He'd come home, his mom would cry, and his dad would throw him out of the house. He could already hear the screaming.

And even if they did let him into the house, what about his stuff? His dad had probably sold half of it for beer money by now.

"We'll have to see about setting up a new identity for you," Giles continued when it looked like Xander wasn't going to respond, "and see if we can enroll you in school again."

Hearing this, Xander came out of his melancholy thoughts to look at Giles in horror. "You mean I have to go to school like this?"

He couldn't imagine a thing he wanted to do less. Because, sure, he had been going to school each day, but that was just to the library, not to the actual _school_ where everyone could see him.

He couldn't go there as a girl. Everybody would _know_.

They'd recognize him somehow and laugh at his cross-dressing ways.

"Of course," Giles replied, "We don't want you getting too far behind in your schoolwork."

"But . . . but _Giles_ . . . I can't go like _this_," Xander's voice dangerously close to a whine, he gestured at his girl-body.

"That's what the new identity is for," Giles said with a small disapproving frown, obviously thinking Xander didn't want to go for slacker reasons, "We have no idea how long it will take for us to find a cure and I won't have you skipping out on your education."

"But . . ."

"Xander . . ." Giles gave him a stern look in warning. Obviously there would be no chance for changing his mind.

"Fine." Xander frowned, crossing his arms over his chest and was almost able to not freak out at the feel of breasts. Progress.

* * *

Putting his hands into his duster pockets, Spike kicked some of the fallen debris at his feet irritably and glared at the empty warehouse.

Where the bloody hell was she?

How far could somebody in her condition actually go?

She was weak. She could barely even hunt for herself. What the fuck was she doing running off by herself?

For the past week, as long as he had been able to go outside, Spike had been searching for Drusilla in every abandoned factory, warehouse, or crypt that he could find in the hopes that Dru hadn't just skipped town on him. So far, he hadn't had any luck and he was running out of places to search. Only a few more crypts, with maybe one more factory, and that was it. If Dru wasn't in any of those then she was gone for good.

Spike sighed, looking down at the dirty floor.

He couldn't imagine what he'd do if she was gone for good.

The bint had been right. This human thing was starting to sound more and more permanent and that wasn't good.

He couldn't be a human. It just wasn't right.

He was Spike, Master Vampire, Master of the Hellmouth, William the Bloody, one of the bloody Scourge of Europe. Just the mention of his name was enough to send lesser demons running. And for him to be _human_?

It was pathetic.

And it was already making him soft. He hadn't killed anyone in over a week. Had actually not even seriously thought of doing so since that first day.

He couldn't go on like this. He needed to find Drusilla.

Besides all of his more poncy reasons for looking for her, Drusilla was starting to look like his best bet for a cure. If all else failed there was always the possibility of Dru turning him again, returning everything to the way it should be.

Problem was that he had to find her first, and to find her he needed access to his old abilities and contacts. He needed to be a vampire.

He sighed again, giving the empty warehouse one last look.

Maybe he should start working on his back-up plan.

* * *

The four of them seated in the library trying to figure out just what it was that they should be doing in order to create a cure, Xander sighed in frustration, propping his head up with a hand and flipping boredly through a large and dusty book. "And we can't just find some other spell to make me a guy again, why?" he asked, "I mean, I know it's not technically a real cure, but I'd still be a guy again, right?"

Giles shook his head, not looking up from his own book as he answered, "I'm afraid that wouldn't work. Most curses simply don't work like that. It would be too easy and thus not a curse."

"Of course," Xander grumbled sullenly and flipped to another page. This was not turning out to be a good day for him.

Showing up at the library that day, he was only given another reason to start accepting his girlhood when it became clear that they had an even longer way to go in search of his cure than he had thought.

A realization which was only helped along all the more by Giles' less than heartening lecture on the cure-finding process and all of the little ingredients they needed. These little ingredients being such essentials as large amounts of free time, experts in the supernatural field of curse-breaking, a magical lab-type area complete with lab-rats, and a significant amount of information on the curse in need of breaking.

All of which they didn't have and had little chance of ever getting.

Hell, by next week a new baddie would probably pop up and there went a whole week of work. The Hellmouth was a busy place and his new girlhood wasn't all that important when faced with mass murder or an apocalypse.

"Well, what if I just stopped fearing whatever it is I fear?" Xander asked, remembering Spike's question from the day before, "I mean, that could work, couldn't it?"

Giles frowned slightly, seemingly considering this thought. "That is a possibility," he said and Xander felt his hopes beginning to rise, only for them to be crushed as Giles continued, "But I wouldn't put too much hope in it. We . . . we still don't quite know which fear it is exactly that has brought on this particular form and there are some things in life that a person can just never stop fearing."

Hopes dying as quickly as they had come, Xander slumped miserably in his seat. "Well that's just great."

"Of course, it couldn't hurt to try," Giles quickly added, obviously noticing Xander's darkening expression.

"We could even go get you some self-help books, or something," Willow said, trying to be helpful,

"What, like, How to Conquer Your Fear in Only 12 Steps ?" Buffy asked, turning to Willow.

"Exactly."

Hearing their plans for him, Xander shook his head tiredly and sighed, "This is pointless," closing his book and pushing it away from him.

Because, really, what did it even matter if he was cured now? He was already dead to everyone but Spike and the three in this room.

"I'm sorry?" Giles asked.

"I said: this is pointless," Xander repeated and barely remembered not to cross his arms over his chest. He slumped further down in his chair instead.

"No it's not," Willow protested, turning to him, "My cousin Cindy read a self-help book once and she swears it worked."

"And even if they don't, you can always try something else," Buffy said.

"I dunno," Xander looked down at the tabletop unhappily, "Why even bother? It's hopeless anyways."

"No it's not," Willow said again, looking upset at his negativity.

Buffy gave him a worried look. "Since when have you been so negative?"

Xander didn't look up, saying miserably, "Since I've died."

"Now, Xander, just because the paper says—

"I'm dead, Giles," Xander interrupted, giving Giles a look, "Dead."

"Well then you're awfully talky for a dead guy," Buffy said.

"You know what I mean," he said, turning to her, unimpressed, "Everyone thinks I'm dead. I can't just come back after that."

"Why not?" Buffy asked. "Just say you ran away and then decided to come back."

"And that'll work?" he asked somewhat skeptically.

"Why wouldn't it?"

Xander thought this over. It would probably work for most people, but his parents?

Probably.

It wouldn't save his stuff but it might be able to get him back in the house.

Xander sighed and sat up straighter in his seat. There was the slightest chance that this could work, might as well stop moping and get to it. "Alright. So what do I have to do then?"

"Self-help books," Willow reminded him.

"Right. So we go get some? Anybody have any money?"

"Giles does," Buffy said, and they all turned to Giles expectantly, who sighed and got out his wallet.

"If you must."

* * *

Just before sundown, after most vampires had woken up but before they could go outside, Spike stood at Angel's doorstep, looking at the small piece of paper in his hand then at the door in front of him. This was the right address.

He knocked and waited impatiently for the door to open, which it finally did, revealing a surprised looking Angel. The git probably didn't get many visitors.

"Spike? What are doing—"Angel stopped, giving Spike a closer look. "You're human," he said, sounding amazed.

"I need a favor," Spike said, direct and to the point, ignoring that Angel had spoken. He was on a tight schedule here, needing to be back at the Watcher's place before it got dark and they sent the Slayer out to fetch him.

"A favor?" Angel asked, shaking off his amazement and starting to look suspicious, "What kind of favor?"

"Nothing bad. Jus' need you to find Dru for me."

Crossing his arms, Angel casually leaned against the door way, safe from the last few remaining rays of sunlight, and furrowed his brow, "Drusilla left town about a week ago," he said, "I thought you knew."

Dammit. He'd hoped she hadn't done that. Now finding here would be almost impossible.

But it also confirmed some of his own suspicions. "Do you know where to?" Spike asked.

"I . . ." Angel seemed to hesitate, looking Spike over again, and a strange expression grew on his face, "I don't think chasing her would be a very good idea."

Spike narrowed his eyes, suspicious. "Why not?"

"The curse," Angel said almost cautiously, "It made you . . . different."

"I know that."

"No, not that. I mean different as in I'm standing right here and can't feel a thing from you. The bond is gone."

Gone?

Impossible.

They bond couldn't just disappear. It was . . . . . and Spike stopped, realizing something. It was something between two vampires.

He was human

A bad feeling growing in the pit of his stomach, Spike focused on the link that, weak as it was with Angel, still should have been there.

It wasn't.

"You're not a vampire anymore," Angel continued, sounding off in the distance, "The bond must have broken the minute you became human."

Broken?

"No . . ." Spike shook his head in denial. "No. It's there. You just . . . You're wrong."

Trying again, Spike delved inward, searching almost frantically for that sense of connection to Angel and then to Dru.

Neither bond was there.

"No . . ." Spike shook his head again. He couldn't believe this was happening. "There's no way—

Angel actually had the gall to look at him sympathetically. "Dru probably felt the bond vanish and thought you were dust."

Dust? Dru thought he was gone?

Fuck. That wasn't good.

What was she going to do now? Who was going to take care of her when she had one of her episodes? Who was going to make sure she stayed fed?

Hell, what was _he_ going to do without her?

There was no way she was going to help him now.

Spike looked up at Angel. Maybe . . .

"You have to turn me."

"What?" Angel blinked, obviously startled at the sudden command.

"You have to turn me," Spike repeated, "It's the only way."

Angel shook his head. "I'm not going to turn you."

"You have to," Spike said, trying to appeal to Angel's more sire-like and protective emotions, "I have to find Dru. You know she can't take care of herself."

"Spike," Angel said, sounding firm in his decision, "No."

The appealing obviously useless, Spike stopped and glared at Angel. "An' why not?" he demanded.

"Well, for one," Angel said, talking to him as though he were stupid, "it wouldn't help you. You'd be my Childe, not hers. You wouldn't even care about her anymore."

"Yes, I would," Spike insisted stubbornly.

"No, you wouldn't and you know it."

"Y' jus' don't want t' help me," Spike accused angrily.

"That doesn't make what I said any less true," Angel said pointedly, turning the accusation on him, "You should be happy. You're getting a second chance on life, here."

"Well maybe I don't _want_ life," Spike snarled.

"You're being an ungrateful little brat," Angel growled, "Here you are, with the best thing that could've happened to—

"Fine," Spike interrupted Angel's growing rant, and turned to leave, "I'll get someone else to help me then."

"Nobody is going to turn you," Angel called after him.

Walking away with his hands clenched at his sides, Spike grit his teeth angrily. "We'll see about that."

* * *

TBC


	10. All Very Self Help

Disclaimer: I don't own Buffy or its characters and if there are actually books out there with the same titles as the books in here then it's just a coincidence and I don't own those either.

* * *

-

Chapter #10: All Very Self-Help

-

Spike had to be honest with himself. Nobody was going to turn him.

Other than Angelus and Drusilla there were no other Master Vampires in town that he could possibly ask. There were no other Master Vampires in town period. All that was left were minions and there was no way in hell that he was going to become one of them.

His earlier anger with Angelus depleting, Spike opened the Watcher's front door with a sigh. He just didn't know what to do anymore.

Drusilla was gone. Angelus wouldn't help him. The Slayer and her little gang were useless. He had no contacts or power as long as he was human. He had nothing.

He dropped down into his armchair with another sigh and stared listlessly at the dark screen of the television. What was he going to do now?

Curled up at the end of the sofa, Xander didn't look up from her book. "Hey," she greeted absently.

Spike grunted in response, still lost in thought.

What was he going to do now? He couldn't stay like this.

He was SpikeWilliam the Bloody. Part of the Scourge of Europe. Things like this were supposed to happen to other people not him

"Oh hey," Xander looking up from her book as she seemed to remember something, "I have something for you," she said, putting aside her book and reaching over to grab something from a plastic bag on the side table.

"Yeah?" Spike asked and turned to her, his curiosity dragging him from his thoughts.

"Yeah. Here." Shifting over in her seat, she held out a hardback book for him to take.

He reached over and grabbed the book from her hands. Sitting back, he turned it around to read the cover. _Fearless: How to Overcome Your Fears and Start Living Your Life._

Spike blinked, confused. "Wot's this?"

"Self-help book," Xander answered, already turning back to her own book.

Spike shot her an annoyed look. "I can see that. Wot's it for?"

Xander looked back over at him. "Well, you remember when you asked about what would happen if we just stopped fearing whatever it is we're fearing?"

He remembered. She hadn't had an answer for that one. "Yeah?"

"Well, I asked Giles that and he said there was a possibility that it could work. So we went to the bookstore and got some books," She held up her own book for him to read the cover. _Facing Your Fears: A Journey into the Unconscious_

Spike looked down at his own book somewhat skeptically. "An' these are supposed t' help?"

Xander shrugged, putting her book down. "It's better than nothing."

"Right." These people were even more hopeless than he'd thought. There was no way a self-help book was going to work.

"I've actually been reading some of mine and it doesn't seem too bad," she said, "Incredibly cheesy and embarrassing, but not too bad. And who knows? Maybe it'll work."

Spike snorted derisively and opened his book to take a peek at the first chapter. _Phobias, Insecurities, and More _

There was no way he was using this.

It was good to know that there was a possible cure on the way, but he was not lowering himself to the level of using some useless self-help book. He'd just do it by himself.

"Xander, is Spike back yet?" the Watcher asked, coming in from the kitchen as he wiped his hands on a towel. Noticing Spike's presence, he stopped. "Oh good. You're just in time for dinner. Both of you go wash up."

Spike didn't protest the order, carelessly tossing his book to the side and getting up to go wash his hands. He hadn't eaten since breakfast and he was starving, his stomach starting to emit those strange soft growling noises.

Human hunger was an odd feeling to feel again after so long, but it seemed he was starting to get used to it.

* * *

The next day, Xander and the others were in the library, Buffy and him crowding around Willow at the computer. Willow had done some hacking and they were in the middle of constructing an entirely new life for him, from birth certificates to school records and on. Giles was in his office pretending not to notice them doing anything illegal.

They already had a name for him—Alexandra Harrison—which was close enough to his real name that he wouldn't forget it but far enough away to not raise any questions.

She'd had a relatively normal life. Average grades with an average home-life, nothing worse than a few detentions on her permanent record and a broken wrist from her years playing soccer on her medical records.

The problem had come in when it came to back-story and place of residence. They'd needed some reason for Xander's home address to be Giles' place, without getting into any creepy territory, so Xander was now the daughter of one of Giles' close friends from college. Her parents had just recently died in a car accident in LA and so she was moving to Sunnydale to live with her godfather Giles. There were no other family relations as both parents had been the only child and all grandparents had died years before.

Her first day of school was Monday. It was now Wednesday and Xander wasn't looking forward to it in the least.

Because really. Who would actually look forward to something like that? Not only was it school, it was the final step towards the complete death of his life as Xander. Once he had stepped through those school doors, he would be dead and gone and some strange new girl would be taking his place.

As long as he could stay hidden he would have some chance at remaining who he was. Willow, Giles, and Buffy all knew he was actually Xander and mostly treated him accordingly. The people at school wouldn't do that. They would treat him as a girl and expect him to act like one.

Plus, all of the people that he knew already would treat him like a stranger, because, to them, he was one. He didn't want to have to go through the whole process of meeting everyone he already knew again. He didn't want to have to restart his entire life.

He'd already _had_ a life. Maybe not the best of one, but it had been his and he'd kind of liked it.

That eye-thing had taken it all away. Everything he had ever done or had or owned was now gone. Just like that. One little look at a rock and it had all vanished.

This was still all Spike's fault, no matter what that bastard said otherwise. He should never have even tried to use that thing on Buffy. If it hadn't been for him none of this would have ever happened.

"Okay. And I'm done," Willow said, lifting her hands from the keyboard.

"Really?" Xander asked, standing behind her and reading over her shoulder, his hands on the back of her chair. "That's it?" He'd somehow thought it would be a lot more painful than that.

"Yep," Willow said cheerfully and looked up at him, "You are now officially Alexandra Marie Harrison. Congratulations."

Xander grimaced at the sound of his new name, feeling himself dragged down even further. "Well at least I'm getting a better middle name than LaVelle."

"Yeah. Way to look on the bright side there, Xan," Buffy said sarcastically.

"What?" Xander asked a touch irritably, looking over at her. He was trying to stay positive here. "Am I supposed to be excited or something? You guys are just lucky that I'm not going totally berserker over here."

Willow turned in her chair to face him, looking a little worried. "Why would you be going berserker?"

"Oh I dunno," Xander said sarcastically, turning back to her, "Maybe because I'm now officially a girl? That's not really something of the good, you know."

"It's not really something of the bad, either," Buffy said, giving him a weird look. Like he was the crazy one.

"Yes it is," Xander said, shocked by her inability to see the obvious wrong of the situation, "It's totally of the bad. How can you even say that?"

"Oh c'mon," Buffy said, giving him a look, "You've been a girl for, what, like, two weeks now? And you didn't freak out any other time. How is now any different?"

"It's different. It's way different."

"Yeah?" Buffy crossed her arms and looked at him challengingly. "How?"

"It's different because it's official."

"But nothing's changed."

"_Everything's_ changed," Xander stressed, "It's _official_."

"Does being official really matter?" Willow asked, obviously a little confused by his logic.

"Of course it does," Xander said, turning to her, trying to make her see, "It makes everything official."

"Okay and now you're just getting repetitive," Buffy said, looking a little annoyed.

Which Xander could admit that he was. He just didn't know how to explain it any better than that.

This time was different because it was official. All of those other times had basically been nothing because, in comparison, they were only a minor change. He'd still had his life; it had just been on hold for a while.

Now he didn't even have that. According to the United States government, he was now officially a girl. You couldn't get around something like that. His life as a guy, and as himself, was officially over.

Xander Harris had died and Alexandra Harrison had been born.

"My entire life has just been destroyed, Buffy."

Buffy rolled her eyes. "Oh, don't be so dramatic."

"I'm not being dramatic," Xander said in exasperation, "How would you like it if you were suddenly changed into some strange guy and had your entire life ripped away from you?"

"Your entire life has not been ripped away from you."

"Oh yeah?" Xander said challengingly, "Name one thing—one thing—that hasn't been taken away."

"Well . . ." Buffy bit her lip cutely as she thought for a moment and then smiled at him, coming up with, "Well, you still have us."

Which was true, but not really making him any happier. He wanted his life back too.

"And when this is over, everything will be back to normal," Buffy continued positively. "This isn't permanent. You just have to stick it out for a few more days."

And Xander wished he could go back to being that deluded. It was becoming obvious that Buffy and Willow were refusing to let go of the idea that his change would be miraculously cured overnight. He wasn't going to be cured that easily and that was that. If he could admit to it why couldn't they?

God. If those self-help books didn't work out he didn't know what he would do.

He shook his head, turning away from Buffy's smiling face. He needed to get away for a bit. "I'm going to the bathroom."

* * *

Getting to where the school bathrooms were, Xander stood outside in the hall and eyed the two doors. The one on his right read clearly 'Women.' The other on his left read 'Men.' Which one should he choose?

It was a major dilemma because if he chose 'Women' then he'd be admitting that he was a girl. But if he chose 'Men' then it would just be really awkward if he walked in there and some guy was already there.

Eventually, after a few tense moments of considering each door, he gathered up his courage and decided to just take the plunge. He was a woman now—he could admit to it—so the door to his right it would be.

Now he stood in front of the mirror and stared at his reflection. This was his face from now on. It was probably time to start getting used to it.

Oh, God. He didn't want to have to get used to it.

This wasn't his face. This wasn't his body. He didn't want to do this anymore.

Xander reached out to touch his reflection in the mirror, slowly letting fingers slide down the reflection of his face. Biting his lip, he felt tears beginning to form behind his eyes and desperately tried to blink them back. He would not start crying. He wouldn't.

So what if his outsides were a bit gender-confused. He was a guy and he would act like one.

It was a few quiet moments of staring at his new reflection and trying to keep himself from crying before Willow quietly slipped in the door and obviously noticed how close he was to tears. Coming up to him, she asked softly, "Xander?" putting a hand on his shoulder comfortingly, her reflection showing her concern, "Xander, what's wrong?"

Xander sniffled wetly, whispering, "I'm in the girls' bathroom."

Willow's concern seemed to grow at this answer and his reaction to it. "Xander . . ."

"The girls', Willow," he repeated just to make sure that she got it, "The _girls_'."

Willow didn't really have anything good to say to that. "I know," she finally said lamely.

Nodding, Xander bit his lip and clenched the sides of the sink, closing his eyes and hunching over. This was just really too much for him. He wasn't used to this much emotion. How did girls deal?

Why couldn't he just go back to being in denial? He'd _liked_ denial. It had been working good for him so far. Why did it have to fail _now_ of all times?

Maybe girls just weren't as good as deluding themselves as guys were. They were more emotional so that could make sense.

"You always seemed so okay with everything," Willow finally said after a few quiet moments, "And happy. Are you not happy?"

"Happy?" Xander choked out, opening his eyes and turning to his friend, "Willow . . . I'm a _girl._ How on earth could I be happy?"

"Well . . ." Willow hesitated, "I guess I didn't think that this would be that hard. Being a girl isn't really that horrible, is it?"

"Did you not hear Giles when he said mental torture?"

"Oh no," Willow shook her head, "No, I did, I just. . . .You seemed to be handling it so well."

"Of course I did," Xander mumbled bitterly, looking away. He'd only had buttloads of experience with his parents, after all. He'd thought that at least Willow would be able to see past that.

Apparently not.

Xander wiped away the tears with his arm and sniffled again.

"I'm sorry," Willow said. And she truly did look sorry. "I guess I just can't even imagine what it's like, huh?"

"No . . ." Xander said and softly shook his head, "The only one that could possibly understand is Spike and he's an asshole."

"Yeah . . ." Willow agreed, looking down.

Xander sighed. He guessed he was just going to have to deal with this without them.

* * *

It had been a long and boring day.

Spike was, in a way, still getting used to the idea of being awake in the daytime and asleep at night. It was a weird concept to him and it had been playing on his body for the last week. His body would say that it was time to sleep but his mind would know that it wasn't. He'd tried to combat the sleepiness by going out and searching for Dru, but now that he didn't have that, and that all he had to do was sit about on his arse in his enemy's house watching bad daytime telly, it was getting harder to fight.

He was bored and tired and thinking of taking a nap, but knew that that would just mean he would be bored and awake and hating it in the middle of the night when he wasn't allowed to be up.

And wasn't that sad. He, a Master vampire, had a bedtime. And even worse – he actually followed that bedtime.

He had to. They had made it more than clear that unless he cooperated he wouldn't be getting any freedom or food. What else could he do but comply?

This was horrible.

Spike sighed miserably, raising the remote to turn off the telly. Then stared for a moment at the blank screen.

He could see his reflection in the glass. Distorted and small, but still. It was a reflection.

Wonderful. Another reminder.

Dragging his eyes away, he searched the room for anything to do. His eyes finding themselves inexorably drawn to the self-help book the bint had given him last night, he paused. Was he really that bored and desperate?

A second's thought gave him the answer: Yes.

Hating himself for it, Spike reached over and grabbed the book. This had to be a new low for him.

But who knows? Maybe the bint would be right and it actually could work. Anything to get out of this miserable existence.

Flipping to the first chapter, Spike settled in to read. He had a few more hours before the bint and the Watcher were due home. There was no way that he was going to be caught reading this.

* * *

TBC


	11. The Trouble With People

Okay, I wanted to thank those that reviewed. I love every review that I get.

* * *

Chapter #11: The Trouble with People

A few more days passed with nothing changing. A cure continued to not be found, Xander stayed a girl, and Spike grew increasingly more and more annoying. Buffy had apologized for that day in the library, but it was clear that she still had no idea what it was that had made him so upset.

It was now his first day back at school and Xander was standing in front of the building, trying to work up the strength to actually walk through the doors.

"Come _on_, Xander," Buffy said impatiently, looking back at him in annoyance. "We're gonna be late."

"Why don't you two just go ahead?" Xander suggested hopefully, staring at the building in fear. "I'll be fine out here for a little while."

"We're not just gonna leave you here on your first day back like this," Buffy said.

"I'll be fine. I swear," Xander insisted, "I just . . . I just need a few minutes, that's all."

"Are you sure?" Willow asked, looking concerned.

Xander waved the concern off. "Positive. Just go on without me. I'll be right there."

Willow looked hesitant but thankfully gave in. "Well if you're sure . . ."

"I'm sure."

Buffy and Willow gave him one last glance, but eventually dragged themselves away from his side and went into the school. Watching them go, Xander stared at the doors closing behind them and tried to tell himself that they were just doors. That they didn't mean anything.

They were just two pieces of wood, after all. Two pieces of wood that swung back and forth to allow people to enter or leave. You pushed them or pulled the handles and they opened. Nothing special. No great feat of engineering.

"Hey, are you new?"

Startled out of his contemplation of the doors, Xander looked over with wide eyes to find some guy looking down at him with a mildly curious expression. "Huh?" was his intelligent reply.

"Are you new?" the guy repeated, "You look lost."

"Oh, um, yeah" Xander licked his lips uncomfortably and looked down. The guy was still looking at him and Xander wasn't so sure he liked it. Could he tell? Did he know? Beginning to draw in on himself, Xander tightened his grip on his backpack. "Yeah I'm new. First day and everything."

"Then I'm Ryan," he said. And was it just him or was this guy standing way too close?

"Alexandra," Xander said the name uneasily, this being the first time he would actually have to answer to it. "Call me Xan."

Ryan nodded agreeably. "Where are you from?" And he was still _looking_ at him. Why wouldn't he _stop_ that? He must know. He must think Xander was a freak.

Xander smiled weakly as he used their cover story. "LA?" Would it be rude if he backed up a few steps?

Ryan smiled back. Freaky. "Cool. You probably have tons of stories. You'll probably notice it but we don't really get out much in this town."

"Uh, yeah, I've noticed," Xander said, shifting his grip on his backpack uncomfortably, and then looked around almost desperately at all the students brushing by them to get into the school. He wanted out of this conversation. "Um, don't we need to be getting to class?"

"Nah, we still have a few minutes," Ryan said carelessly but then _looked_ at him again. "But you probably need to go to the office, right? C'mon. I'll show you."

"Oh, no. No," Xander shook his head, backing up a bit. He didn't need to be around this person for any longer. "That's okay. I can find it by myself."

"No. C'mon," Ryan insisted, "You'll get lost and you really don't want to be late on your first day. The principal here is a real troll."

"No. No, really. I'll find it. Don't worry," Xander waved him off, already quickly walking away. "Thanks though. It was nice meeting you." And walked through the doors and away from the guy before he even knew what he was doing. Once inside though, he stopped and looked back. Had he really just done that? Just walked through the doors?

It hadn't actually been as bad as he'd thought it would be. He'd expected to feel like something had died inside of him, but he felt completely normal. Well, as normal as he could feel when he was a girl, at least.

Smiling a little, Xander nodded to himself. Maybe he could actually do this.

* * *

Maybe he couldn't actually do this. 

The day so far had been . . . stressful. That was the only way to put it. Not counting his little trip to the mall, this was his first time being around anyone other than the gang and Spike since The Change and Xander didn't know if he was up to being around all of these people. They just got too close and he was so small and they would _look_ at him and everything would kind of close in around him.

On paper it wasn't going too bad. He went to his classes, smiled and introduced himself to the people there, and basically did what he did every day. And if he was a little quieter then usual or strangely careful of touching his fellow classmates then so what? He was entitled.

He even had a few classes with Buffy and Willow which was definitely of the good. It would've been just his luck to have an entirely new schedule and not have any classes with his girls.

And could he actually still call them that? His girls? Because technically he was a girl now too, so that didn't really work.

Seated in the last class before lunch, tapping his pencil against his desk as he waited for the minute hand to slowly inch its way around the clock and finally let him out of this school hell for at least an hour, Xander pondered the question.

He didn't feel like a girl, so maybe it still worked. Maybe as long as he still thought of himself as a guy he could call them whatever he wanted.

And, oh God. Had he actually just thought of thinking of himself as a girl? Like, a real girl?

This girl thing wouldn't come to that would it? He wouldn't lose his sense of male-ness, would he?

He had a sudden image of him losing all trace of who he was and embracing his girlhood, wearing dresses, putting on make-up, and giggling about boys.

He shuddered. Not if he had anything to say about it.

Suddenly he wanted to do something really manly. Like scratch himself in public and belch. But he couldn't exactly do that in class, and oh yeah, he didn't really have anything to scratch. He didn't have a penis.

And that thought just made him want to scratch more than ever. Like, he'd do _anything_ to scratch.

But he couldn't and so he'd settle for just being able to move. To have space to get up and pace or something.

The room was too small, the people too close, he'd lost all track of what was going on in class, and did everyone have to keep _looking_ at him like that? Staring at him with their _eyes._

They mustknow. It was so obvious. They must know and think he was a freak. Why wouldn't they? He _was_ a freak.

Who was he kidding thinking that he could do this? He couldn't do this.

And God he needed to move. Why couldn't he just _move_?

The rhythm of his pencil speeding up, Xander looked up at the clock. Five more minutes till the end of class.

Impatient, his leg began to bounce.

Two more minutes.

Xander bit his lip, staring at the clock, willing it to move faster.

The school bell rang.

Jumping out of his seat, shoving his books into his bag, and rushing for the door, just wanting to get out of there and to where there was some space, he got to the crowded hallway and froze.

Oh right. He had to go through that.

Just what he needed when he was already this close to freaking out.

He'd had to do this before of course. Would have to do this a couple times a day switching classes, but that didn't mean he liked it. He'd gotten used to the crowded halls in the years that he'd been at this school, but he'd been used to them at a bigger size. Now he just felt tiny and fragile and pushed along uncontrollably by the steady stream. Not something he liked.

Still. Impatient classmates grumbling at his back, one rudely pushing his way past his shoulder, Xander swallowed, steeled himself for the trip, and dove into the stream. Jostled this way and that, enclosed on all sides, Xander closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and just dealt with it, pushing his way through. It was lunch so he had some time to himself, but he didn't think he could deal with the crowded cafeteria.

He'd go to the library. There was space in the library.

* * *

Almost falling into the library in his haste, Xander stopped once he had reached safety. Not trembling but getting close, he just sort of held himself still and breathed, looking down at the floor as he tried to appreciate the space. It had taken him a while to get there but he had gotten there. 

"Xander?"

Startled, Xander jumped and looked up with wide eyes. Then breathed again when he saw it was just Giles, coming out from behind the stacks. He should've expected him to be there. This _was _the library.

Standing up straighter, trying to act like nothing was wrong, he attempted a smile. Weak but there. "Hey, G-man. What's up?"

"I believe I've asked you repeatedly not to call me that," Giles said and frowned, not looking convinced by his attempt at normalcy as he approached, "Are you quite alright?"

"Oh, I'm fine. Peachy. Peachy-keen," Xander said, trying to put energy into his words when he just felt drained, "Am I using that right? Peachy-keen? It means I'm fine, doesn't it? Because that's what I am. Fine. I'm totally fine. In fact, I have reached totally new levels of fine in my fine-ness. That's how fine I am. Which is fine." Quickly, before he could say anything else, Xander shut up. People who were fine didn't babble about how fine they were.

But Giles looked bemused. "Is that so?"

Xander nodded and made a noise of agreement, "Mmhmm," carefully keeping his mouth closed

Clearly not believing him, Giles nevertheless played along. "Then may I ask why you're here?"

Xander tried to play innocent, rocking back and forth on his feet nervously. "What, can't I visit my favorite book-man anymore?"

"Not when you appear ready to jump out of your skin at any moment."

"I'm just excited!" Xander said, bouncing once in place, "There's so many . . ." casting about for something to be excited about, he ended up with, "books here." Okay and that was lame. Like G-man wasn't going to see straight through that one.

"Yes," Giles said, obviously amused at his attempt, "As would be expected of a library."

Xander smiled a little too brightly. "Yeah! See? Library's they're just so . . . so great! You know, 'cuz of all the books and stuff. People need books. Where else could we find out the things we need to know? Computers? Pah, I say. Pah!"

"And not that I'm not trilled to see you finally taking an interest, but may I ask what brought this particular revelation on?"

"Oh, you know . . ." Xander said, waving a hand as casually as he could with it shaking, "I was just in class, and I thought to myself, 'Where would we be without books?' And I realized - 'Nowhere'. And, let me tell you, Giles, that thought scared me. It seriously scared me. I had to come here as soon as possible just to reassure myself that there are books in this world."

Giles just sort of looked at him, still amused but obviously deciding that the nonsense had gone on for too long, "Xander, is something wrong? Has something happened?"

Xander shook his head and tried to relay his seriousness with his eyes. "Nothing's happened. Everything's fine."

"Xander . . . If something's happened then—"

"Giles!" Buffy called loudly, barging into the library. Xander jumped in surprise at the noise and turned to stare at her with wide eyes before going back to pretending that everything was normal. "Giles have you seen— Oh, never mind," she said, her eyes landing on Xander, standing right in front of her, "Xander. Where have you been?" she demanded. "You were supposed to meet us at the lockers."

"Uh, yeah . . ." Xander shifted uncomfortably, remembering. How was he going to explain that one? They wouldn't believe his intense desire to be around books story any more than Giles had.

"Are you okay?" Willow asked in concern, having followed Buffy into the library much more quietly. Getting closer, she reached out a hand to touch his shoulder and Xander held himself still. He didn't want to hurt Willow's feelings by backing away, but she was seriously getting too close. Unfortunately, Willow actually noticing things about him, she saw his reaction and her concern grew. "Xander?"

Xander tried to act like nothing had happened. "Yeah?"

"Is something wrong?"

Xander's mouth opened to say 'nothing', but lying to Willow just felt wrong. It was a little awkward with Giles and Buffy there, but Xander sighed and forced himself to tell her the truth, feeling all the nervous, jittery, energy of the last few minutes leave him, leaving him tired and drained. "I'm just having a little trouble with people."

"Were they bothering you?" Buffy demanded in that must-protect-all kind of way she had.

"No," Xander shook his head, looking down, and tried to hug his arms to his chest. Feeling breasts, he let his arms fall back to his sides. It was irritating. He needed the comfort, but he couldn't get it. "Not like that. They were just . . . There was just so many of them, y' know? Way too many and way too close. Like, on top of me close. And they kept looking at me. Judging me with their eyes," getting lost in the memory of the badness, he stared into space for a moment before shaking himself out of it and looking up at his friends, "I just needed some space."

"Oh . . ." Buffy sounded almost disappointed. Probably because this meant she couldn't beat someone up and make the problem go away. She was like that.

"Do you wanna sit down?" Willow asked hesitantly.

"Not really." He liked the space he had here. He liked being able to move. Looking up, he smiled weakly at their concerned faces. "Don't worry. Just give me some space and I'll be fine."

Still worried, Buffy frowned, turning to Giles. "Is this another eye-thing?"

Giles considered this. "I think it may be. Tell me," he said to Xander, "Has this just started today or have you felt like this before?"

Xander tried to think back. "I've really only been around a lot people when we went to the mall that day. You know, for the clothes? And I was a little too preoccupied with trying to get out of shopping and then with my little melt-down to care. So I guess it's just today."

Giles looked thoughtful. "Hmm . . ."

Willow turned to him, worried. "Does that mean something? Xander's going to be okay, isn't he? This thing isn't going to get any worse? Because that wouldn't really be fair, you know? Xander didn't _do_ anything. This isn't fair."

"Yes, I know. In a perfect world, he wouldn't have had to deal with this situation at all." Giles sighed and took off his glasses to clean them absently. "But to – to be quite honest, I'm not sure. This could mean that the curse is evolving but then it could also simply be yet another facet of the curse that has just not presented itself until today. I'm afraid we may just have to wait and see if anything else, er, pops up."

Xander frowned, uncomfortable with the idea. "I don't think I like that plan. If this thing is evolving or whatever then I could wake up tomorrow pregnant and _then_ what'll happen? I can't take care of a baby."

There was a sound of irritation from behind him. "Why can't you people ever have _normal _conversations?"

Startled by this new voice, they all turned quickly to the doors.

"Cordelia?" Willow asked, confused.

"Yes?" Cordelia asked, looking down on her imperiously.

"What are _you_ doing here?"

"This is a library," Cordelia explained slowly, as though Willow were stupid, and held up a book, "I have a book to return."

"Oh?" Giles said, looking a little confused when she then looked at him expectantly, but then seemed to remember that he was a librarian, "Oh, yes,", putting on his glasses and going to the check-out desk, "Give it here then."

Cordelia passed him the book and as Giles did librarian things she turned to the others with mild curiosity. "So what are you freaks doing? And who's she? Don't tell me you've already found a replacement for the loser."

Xander winced at the reminder. Cordelia didn't recognize him and had called him a she. Ouch.

"What? No. This is Alexandra," Willow said, looking nervous. She was a horrible liar. "She's a girl. Xander was a guy. It's totally different." And again, way to remind him.

"Her name is _Alexandra_? As in Alexander?" Cordelia wasn't stupid. "What you can't have Xander so you go out and hire the next best thing? That's just creepy."

"We didn't _hire_ anybody," Buffy protested.

Cordelia raised a brow. "So she's doing this for free?"

"She's not _doing_ anything."

Cordelia scoffed. "She's filling in the shoes of a dead guy for his creepy friends who can't let him go. Give it up already. Xander's dead. I don't know what you freaks did to make him so, but he's _dead_. Get over it and move on. Stop hiring creepy people to take his place," beginning to look disgusted, "She's not even a good replacement. He may not have acted like one, but Xander was a _guy_."

"Yes. _Thank_ you." Xander was glad that somebody had realized this.

Cordelia looked at him, confused. "What?"

Oh right. Oops. She didn't know and he wasn't going to tell her.

Why was that again? Because of the mockage? It wasn't like she wasn't going to figure it out eventually. They'd already told Ms. Calender.

Xander sighed and made the decision. Might as well just tell her. "We weren't going to tell you but I actually am Xander."

If possible, Cordelia looked even more disgusted, turning back to the others. "And you've got her pretending to be him too?"

"No, really," Xander insisted, a little annoyed that she didn't just believe him. "I _am_ Xander. There was this curse and, well, this happened." He gestured at his girl body.

"Right," Cordelia scoffed, looking skeptical, "And you expect me to believe that?"

"You believed vampires were real."

"And I'm afraid she's telling the truth," Giles said, coming back from the check-out desk and his librarian things, "There was an incident two weeks ago that has left us with some rather, well, persistent consequences."

And letting that run through his head, Xander frowned. Did Giles just call him she? He'd been called she before but only around people that didn't know and Cordelia knew.

That seemed to get through to Cordelia though. Giles wasn't exactly known for his practical jokes. "No way. For real? _This_ is the loser?" Cordelia looked far too amused and laughed. "Oh my God. That's great!"

"It's not _that _funny," Xander grumbled, wanting to cross his arms over his chest petulantly.

"Are you kidding? It's hysterical. I always told you you were a girl."

Xander didn't say anything, not looking happy. Giles had called him she!

Cordelia just laughed some more. "Oh you have to tell me everything."

* * *

TBC 


	12. A Narrow Escape

I wanted to say thank you to those that reviewed including Slip of the hand, escape5, Alwaysand, jazzy2may, Fairytopia, and Narias. Thank you! Also sorry for how long this chapter took to get out. I haven't abandoned this story.

----------------------------------------------------

-

Chapter #12: A Narrow Escape

-

"_The first step to overcoming fear is to accept that you are afraid. To accept what you fear. When you can do this, and only when you can do this, can you make steps to move past your fear." _

Re-reading that, Spike frowned then looked up from his book and at a reflection which would always be disturbing to see but had been put aside for the moment.

What fears _did_ he have? Or, at least, what fears would he admit to having? To himself if no one else.

He knew he feared abandonment. Which fit in well with Dru leaving him, come to think of it. Spike's frown deepened and he looked down. Maybe that was why she'd done it. Never mind the fact that she'd done it before. Before it had never seemed so final. So maybe she'd come back on her own when he was cured. . . . Maybe . . .

Spike shook his head and got back on track.

What else was he afraid of?

This took thought and some serious soul-searching. And Spike winced. Bad phrase that. He didn't have a soul. He refused to have a soul.

Was that a fear? To have a soul? Spike knew he _really_ didn't want one, so it must be.

Okay so two down. How many did he have? It couldn't be that many.

What else was there? What else did he not want?

He knew he didn't want to be weak. And humans were definitely weak. Weak-willed. Weak-minded. Physically weak. Pathetic.

And that was probably it, Spike realized in a flash of clarity. That was probably why he was human. He didn't want to be weak. If he hadn't minded being weak he would've gotten the soul which would've been horrible and he would've been pathetic but at least he would've been the kind of pathetic that could fight back.

Now, could he accept that he was afraid of these things?

It took a second to realize it. He already had.

Spike blinked at his reflection, somewhat startled to discover this.

And how had that helped?

Looking back down at his book, Spike flipped through the pages in search of the right section. Maybe he'd done something wrong.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Things had gotten better as the week passed and he got more used to people but they never became _too_ much better. Xander still had problems.

He just wasn't used to his new size yet and he didn't think he ever would be completely. After all, how could he? He was used to being a relatively big guy, not huge but not small either, and then something like this comes around and totally throws him for a loop. It was crazy.

Walking down the path to Giles' house after school, Xander got to the door of the house just as Spike was turning into the drive. Turning the knob to find it locked, Xander took out his key and stuck it in the lock. By this time Spike had gotten to the doorstep and he waited almost patiently for Xander to open the door. Pushing the door open, he started to step inside only to have Spike rudely push past him and into the house, shoving him into the doorframe.

"Geez. Rude, much?" Xander said as he rubbed his shoulder where he had impacted with the frame, a little annoyed but getting way too used to Spike's rudeness to really care much. He continued into the house, closing the door behind him, dropping his backpack next to the couch, and heading for the kitchen for a drink.

"Hey G-man," Xander greeted Giles as he walked into the kitchen, not really paying much attention to what Giles was doing in there. He headed straight for the fridge where he took out a soda and turned to lean against the counter as he popped open the top.

"Xander!" Giles said, sounding more than a little surprised. The older man jumped up from his seat at the kitchen table and stood in front of it as though to hide what he was doing.

Xander looked up at him just in time to see Giles sweeping a pile of papers and a bottle of scotch behind him. Getting a little suspicious, he turned to Giles and tried to pretend he hadn't seen anything. "Yeah. Me. What's up?"

"I – I, um," Giles stuttered, seeming a little too nervous.

Xander peered at him closely. "You okay there, G-man?"

"Ye – yes, yes. I am. I just – Xander." Giles turned to Xander seriously, seeming to calm himself, and spoke, "I'm afraid I have some business to attend to tonight. Do you think that you—and – and Spike, of course, mustn't forget him—Do you think you and Spike could possibly vacate the house for tonight?"

Now Xander was really suspicious, but if Giles wanted him out of the house then there really wasn't anything he could do. "Alright. Sure. Let me just go tell Spike, okay?"

Giles seemed a little too relieved. "Yes. Yes, thank you." But he didn't sit back down, continuing to block the table's contents with his body, even going as far as to move with Xander as Xander walked past to block Xander's view from all sides. Xander tried to shrug off Giles's weird behavior, but he couldn't help but be worried. He'd seen the alcohol.

"Hey, dipshit," Xander said, coming into the living room and leaning forward against the armchair behind Spike's head.

Spike growled as best he could with his human vocal cords, but otherwise ignored him.

"Hey. I said, hey," Xander said and reached out to poke Spike's head.

Swiping a hand at him irritably, Spike still didn't turn to look behind him, but he did ask, "Wot?"

"We need to leave," Xander told him.

"No," Spike replied simply and continued to watch the TV.

"Giles needs the house to himself tonight," Xander tried.

"Don't care," Spike replied.

Xander huffed irritably. Trust Spike to be difficult. "Giles says if you don't leave he won't feed you anymore."

At this, Spike finally turned to him with narrow eyes. "Yer makin' that up."

Xander kept his features serious. "You wanna bet on that? 'Cuz I can go ask him, easy."

Spike growled to himself again, but didn't take the bet. Getting up from his seat, he snatched his coat from its spot hanging on the couch and stalked out of the room angrily.

Xander smiled to himself and went to get his own coat. He could probably hang out with Willow tonight or something. He was sure her parents wouldn't mind if they were even there at all.

He didn't even stop and think about where Spike was going to go.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Spike grumbled to himself, unable to believe he was being thrown out of the house just so the Watcher could do whatever it was he was doing in the kitchen. It was probably something shady and the man just didn't want anybody around to catch him at it and have his reputation sullied.

And what was he going to do once it got dark?

Spike shook his head and shoved his hands in his duster pockets as he stalked down the street. Well, he'd think about that once it got here. For now he had at least three hours to kill with nothing to do.

Having a quick think, Spike decided he didn't want to go shopping or do anything in the main part of town, and he couldn't go to Willy's (too many demons and other types that would jump at the chance to beat up a human-him), so he'd just walk.

And so Spike walked. He walked for hours, until his legs were aching and he was tired. Deciding that sitting down would be a good thing; he found a bench and sat. It was getting close to sunset now and Spike wouldn't admit it but he was starting to get worried. He knew better than anyone what kind of things lurked the Sunnydale streets and now that he was human he was essentially those things' number one prey. There weren't any hiding places that he could think of that vampires or other demons hadn't already made into a home so he had no choice but to stay out in the open. He was just begging to be eaten really.

Still. Maybe if he kept walking and stayed away from the really dangerous areas he would be alright.

He hoped.

------------------------------------------------------------

Fours hours into the night and he was still alive. That was good, but Spike had a feeling that his alive status wasn't going to continue being correct, as he was almost positive that something was following him. He could almost hear the sound of heavy footsteps behind him even though the creature was keeping to the shadows and out of his sight.

He stopped again and turned around in another attempt to see the demon stalking him, but still couldn't find him.

Once again he cursed this bloody useless human body. If he'd been a vampire, he'd have the senses to know where and what was stalking him. Of course, if he'd been a vampire, he doubted this demon would be stalking him in the first place. The fact that he was a recognizable figure in the demon world was probably all that was keeping him alive right now. The demon stalking him was probably confused about why the vampire Spike was sending off all the signals of a regular human. Probably couldn't decide whether it should try its luck and trust that this Spike impersonator was actually a human or run away because this actually was Spike. Now if only that confusion could last the rest of the night then things would be just peachy. But Spike had a feeling that the demon had been building up its courage for a while now and was almost to the point where it didn't care whether this was Spike or not. He seemed like a regular human and so the demon would attack.

Spike heaved a sigh and looked up at the night sky, looking at all the stars for a moment before remembering that he couldn't afford a moment's break in his awareness of his surroundings. So he might not be able to fight back, that didn't mean he had to be unprepared.

Spike looked back around him at the happy little row of houses. He'd been keeping mostly to the residential areas, as he knew most demons hunted down by the docks, warehouses, and graveyards. There usually wasn't very good hunting around the homes and he'd been hoping on that to keep him relatively safe. But apparently it hadn't.

The attack came at him at a rush. No matter that he'd been expecting it, it seemed to come at him quicker than he could follow. All he felt was a sudden stabbing pain in his right shoulder and then he had jerked away, only hurting his shoulder worse. Turning around quickly he found himself face to face with a Jefra demon, a demon that looked kind of like a life-size version of a gremlin only a dark orange in color and with three 10-inch claws on each hand. They were incredibly fast and had a habit of eating human innards along with various bits of other animals. The Jefra grinned a grin full of sharp teeth and then attacked again, the demon's claws whipping out faster than Spike could track to rip at him again. Spike managed to duck this time and threw a punch before he could remember that he wasn't as fast or strong as he was used to. The Jefra caught his hand easily and used it to throw him over the demon's shoulder and into one of the bushes lining the street.

Shaking his head and struggling to his feet, Spike didn't have time to think before the Jefra was there again pushing him down to supposedly get at his stomach so that it could start eating. Spike kicked out, knocking the demon off its feet and did the thing he should have done when the demon first appeared. He ran.

He felt like the biggest coward. He'd never run from a demon since he'd been turned except for that one time with the Defrani demon and that was understandable because those things were huge and nearly impossible to kill. This was a measly Jefra. He would normally have kicked a Jefra's orange arse and beat it with its own arm. Ripped out those claws and sell them to a weapons maker to make a pretty penny. And now he was running. Pathetic.

The Jefra didn't let him get far, getting back up onto its feet and loping down the street after Spike's retreating form.

Quickly turning into one of the houses, running over the nicely mowed lawn and through the wooden gate at its side, Spike raced through the backyard and pulled himself over the brick wall in the back as quickly as he could, cursing as he scraped his hands on the hard brick. The Jefra followed behind, seeming to enjoy the chase, the bloody bastard.

Racing down the next street, Spike tried to think quickly about what he could do. There weren't any weapons lying handily around and he couldn't just make one by ripping apart a bench like he normally would do, so what could he do?

He could run, which would only last so long.

He could kick and punch, which were really pretty useless when he was practically as weak as a newborn kitten.

He could die, which seemed more likely with every moment.

Racing up and over another wall in another backyard, Spike ran down the next street, leading the Jefra on what was probably, to it, a nicely refreshing chase. Thinking this just served to make Spike angry. Here he was, a Master vampire in his own right, and he was being chased down like a rat in a cage. It didn't matter that he was human now; this was still insulting.

And it didn't hurt the anger that Spike was feeling fear, true fear for his life, for the first time in almost a century. He hadn't felt this way since he'd disobeyed Angelus on a hunt back when he was still a fledgling.

He continued to list his choices.

He could go to the Watcher's house, but Jefras weren't stopped by simple doors like vampires were and there probably weren't a good weapons there anyway.

He could try and find the Slayer, but who knew where that bint could be.

He could keep running, but eventually he was going to run out of energy.

With one long running leap, the Jefra jumped on his back and Spike was down. Turning over onto his back, he punched and kicked out his legs, trying to get the bloody demon off of him to no luck. The Jefra made that hissing sound that counted as laughter among their species and that just made Spike all the more angry. The fear had also doubled and adrenaline was rushing through his veins. Not that it did him any good.

Was this what it felt like for his own past victims? This stark terror and angry regret that he couldn't be stronger?

The Jefra finally got Spike into a good position and raised its claws, fully prepared to dig into his stomach and eat the innards that worked there. And just as Spike was almost positive that he was dead, truly dead, the Jefra was grabbed and thrown bodily off of him. Blinking in shock Spike just lay there where he was and missed it as the Slayer completed her kill.

Eventually, the Jefra lying dead, his neck snapped, over in the bushes, the Slayer walked over to look down at him. She frowned at what she saw. "Spike? What are you doing out at night? I thought we told you to stay inside."

Spike came out of his shock and scowled at the Slayer as he pulled himself to his feet. Trying to ignore the fact that he was still shaking somewhat (probably because of the adrenaline), Spike dusted himself off and replied, "The Watcher kicked me out. Not my fault."

The Slayer only frowned some more. "What'd you do that made him kick you out?"

Spike glared at her for the assumption. "Nothing. He kicked out Harris too."

The Slayer looked confused for a moment but then nodded as if that settled something and looked at him again and at his bleeding shoulder. "You should really go back to Giles' and get that checked out. Forget what he told you. He's obviously gone crazy."

Ignoring her, Spike adjusted his duster, tugging down the sleeves and getting himself under better control. He tried not to wince as this pulled rough fabric over his bleeding shoulder wound.

"Hey," the Slayer said irritably, "Are you listening to me? I said go home." But then the Slayer seemed to think of something. "No wait. I'll go with you."

At that, Spike scowled at her. "I don't need a bloody babysitter."

The Slayer scowled right back at him. "I'm not babysitting you. I want to talk to Giles. You know, to see what's up. He was supposed to meet me tonight and he wasn't there."

Spike still looked angry with this, but accepted the fact that the Slayer was going to be walking with him. "Fine. Whatever."

Here, the Slayer smiled somewhat, some humor present in her eyes. "Careful there. Somebody might think we were starting to rub off on you."

Spike glared, somewhat angry to realize that she was right. He'd never used the word 'whatever' like that before. "Let's just go."

The Slayer nodded and off they went.

Eventually they got to Giles' house and Buffy knocked on the door. Spike still didn't have a key so he waited semi-patiently for the old man to answer the door which he eventually did.

"Buffy. Spike. What on Earth are you here for?" The Watcher looked bleary and like he'd been drinking too much scotch. Spike ignored him as he pushed his way through the door.

"Spike!" the Watcher protested, turning to give him an angry look. "I believe I told you to stay out tonight."

"Yeah," the Slayer said, following Spike's example and pushing through the door while the Watcher was distracted. She stood in front of the couch and looked at the old man reproachfully. "And I have to wonder. Why is that? Did you forget where we live just like you forgot we were supposed to meet tonight?"

"We – we –" the Watcher looked confused and then seemed to remember, "Oh Buffy. Please forgive me. Something came up and I – I well . . . Are you alright?"

"I'm fine," the Slayer replied, frowning now. "I mean, my feelings were a little hurt, but things went down just fine. Only one bag was damaged."

"Oh good. Good," the Watcher said, seeming satisfied. "Then if everything's alright, would you mind . . ." he trailed off here and indicated that Buffy should leave. "I'm quite busy at the moment. And do you think you could take Spike with you?"

The Slayer frowned deeper at this, but Spike spoke up before she could say anything.

"Oi. I'm not some dog y' can pass around."

"No, no, of course not," the Watcher said absentmindedly, not seeming to even really hear him which just made Spike angry, but then the Watcher looked at the Slayer again. "Please? If there was any other way I wouldn't ask, but I'm afraid there's not."

The Slayer sighed, but seemed to accept that. "Okay. Fine. Spike?" She turned to him and crooked a finger at him, indicating he was coming with her. "You're with me."

Spike scowled. He didn't want to go anywhere with the Slayer, but it didn't seem he had the choice. Grudgingly, he got up from his armchair and almost stomped over to the Slayer's side where he scowled deeper and crossed his arm over his chest. The Slayer said her good-byes to the Watcher and Spike glared at the old man as he followed the Slayer out of the house.

------------------------------------------------------------------

TBC


End file.
